i 

JBtanc 


THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


BY  THE  SAME  AUTHOR 


WITHIN  THE  HEDGE 

THE  CATHEDRAL 

RUSSIAN  LYRICS  AND  COSSACK  SONGS 

NOVELS : 

A  MODERN  PROMETHEUS 
THE   CUCKOO'S   NEST 

A  COSSACK  LOVER 
THE  SIN  OF  ANGELS 


GABRIELLE 

AND  OTHER  POEMS 


GABRIELLE 

AND  OTHER  POEMS 


BY 
MARTHA  GILBERT  DICKINSON  BIANCHI 


NEW  YORK 

DUFFIELD  &  COMPANY 
1913 


COPYRIGHT,  1913,  BY 
DUFFIELD  &  COMPANY 


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I  LIFT  THIS  VINTAGE  OF  MY  HEART 

TO  ONE 

WHO  BLITHELY  DRINKS  WITH  ME, 
EACH  JOYOUS  TOAST  SIMON1DES 
FLUNG  LYRIC  REVELLERS  SUCH  AS  WE  ! 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 

GABRIELLE 3 

A  WANDERER'S  SONG 13 

"AUTRE   Fois" 15 

GYPSYING       16 

THE  WIND 17 

"ZAUBER-DUFT"        18 

A  SONG  OF  SUMMER 20 

A  SUMMER  LETTER 22 

MIDSUMMER    NOON 24 

MIDSUMMER  WAVES 26 

THE  SPIDER'S  WEB 28 

THE  RETURN 29 

To  A  MOUNTAIN  LAKE 31 

WAITING  FOR  THE  STAGE 32 

AT  SUMMER'S  END 35 

IN  AUTUMN  RAIN 37 

THE  DEAD  HUNTER 39 

NOVEMBER  DUSK 41 

IN  JANUARY 42 

REVOLT 44 

TO-NIGHT       48 

CHILD  OF  EARTH 49 

IN  FAREWELL 50 

His  APPEAL • 51 

AT  LAST 52 

OUR  SECRET 53 

MIGNONETTE 54 

THE  SONG  OF  A  SLAVE  TO  HER  MASTER    ......  55 

ONE  DAY 56 

A  LAST  FAVOR 57 

A  SONG  OF  AFTERWARD 58 

THE   CONVICTS 59 

AN    INCIDENT !  60 

AN   ALLEGORY 61 

ANY  MAN  TO  ANY  WOMAN 62 

ANY  WOMAN  TO  ANY  MAN -63 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

THROUGH  THE  IVORY  GATE 64 

I    IN  A  MOON-COLOURED  GARDEN 65 

II    A  DREAM  OF  FIRST  APPEARING 66 

III  WHISPERED  BETWEEN  ^DREAMS 67 

IV  CHANSONETTE  D'UN  REVE 68 

V    OPIUM        69 

VI  ROSEMARY  7° 

VII  ATTAINED  71 

VIII  A  FAREWELL 72 

IX  A  LOVER'S  SONG 73 

X  To  SLEEP 74 

HIDDEN 76 

A  CURSE 77 

AFTER-GLOW 78 

AFTERWARD 79 

FROM  A  GHOST  TO  HER  LOVER 80 

FOR  A  FLY-LEAF  OF  DANTE  . 82 

THE  INTERPRETER 83 

L'ENVOI 84 

To  A  GHOST 85 

THE  LOVER'S  ANSWER 87 

ALLEGRO  CON  GRAZIA — AFTER  TSCHAIKOWSKY  ....  88 

THE  OLD  MUSICIAN go 

THE  LAST  ECHO 91 

To  THE  CELLO 93 

A  STREET  ORGAN  MELODY 94 

UNTO  THE  GOD  OF  PLEASURE 95 

A  CLUB  MAN'S  REQUIEM 97 

DECORATION  DAY 98 

WHERE  GOD  Is 99 

IN  A  HILLSIDE  GRAVE-YARD 100 

THE  CRYPT 101 

THE  MIDSUMMER  OF  A  NUN 102 

A  TALE  OF  TUSCANY 114 

TWILIGHT  AT  FLORENCE 118 

A  LEGEND 120 

RIVIERA  RAIN 121 

IN  THE  PROTESTANT  CEMETERY  AT  ROME 123 

THE  BARBERINI  BEES 124 

BROTHER  RENUNCIO 125 

THE  SONG  OF  A  SLAVE  TO  HER  IDOL 127 

A  SONG  OF  MARINERS 128 

THE  SUPPLIANT 130 

CASSANDRA  ON  LEAVING  TROY 131 


GABRIELLE 


GABRIELLE 

"  In  this  chamber  Gabrielle  de  Latour  died  of  joy.  Here  cer 
tainly  she  had  watched  at  these  windows,  during  ten  whole 
years  for  the  return  of  her  beloved  husband  front  a  disastrous 
battle  in  the  East,  until  against  all  expectation  she  beheld  him 
crossing  the  court  at  last." 

From  Gaston  de  Latour. 

IN  Summers  withered  long  ago, 
Ere  Ronsard  to  his  Mistress  sung  — 
Mid  level  corn-fields  of  la  Beauce 

Fair  Gabrielle  was  young; 
High  in  her  turret  chamber  lone 

Within  the  old  chateau  d' Amour, 
Waiting  her  absent  Lover-Lord, 
The  valiant  de  Latour. 

The  faded  centuries  roll  back, 

Disclose  her  at  her  casement  there, 
The  sunlight  on  her  listless  hands 

And  on  her  burnished  hair; 
Close  on  her  lips  she  holds  the  past, 

Her  eyes  lit  by  a  vanished  face  — 
Red  trees  in  flower  'neath  crimson  skies 

Hot  as  their  last  embrace! 

Before  her  tear-spent  vision  rides 
Her  Love  —  a  stern  crusader  grim 
3 


GABRIELLE 

Wrapt  in  a  mist  of  cruel  steel, 

Her  soul  set  forth  with  him; 
How  can  she  heed  the  cushat  cry 

Or  mournful  plover  voice  the  rain  — 
While  on  her  heart  departing  hoofs 

Renew  their  curt  refrain? 

Her  eyes  see  not  the  spires  of  Chartres 

Across  the  peach  bloom  of  the  plain, 
To  her,  through  endless  leagues  of  corn 

The  sickles  flash  in  vain ! 
Her  ears  hear  neither  chime  nor  dirge, 

Nor  up  the  white  road's  quivering  heat 
All  through  her  life's  long  afternoon 

Or  Knight  or  Pilgrim  feet. 

This  turret  chamber  was  Love's  own, 

Here  the  white  rose  of  Love  flared  wide. 
Here  the  white  Mass  of  parting  said 

In  silence,  side  by  side  — 
A  thousand  secrets  fond  she  knows 

To  bring  her  absent  Lover  near, 
A  thousand  magics  to  beguile 

Incarnate  presence  here. 

No  intimacy  of  the  Faith, 

No  mystic  symbol   eloquent, 
But  broods  within  this  perfumed  place 

His  fervid  sentiment; 
4 


GABRIELLE 

Her  heart's  perpetual  commune 
Suffuses  colour,  sound  and  sight, 

Illumes  each  portal  of  the  sense 
With  Love's  reflected  light. 

Above  the  Christ  of  her  prie-dieu 

Her  Lover's  face  shines  through  her  prayer, 
O'er  milk-white  blossoms  of  the  thorn 

She  loves  to  garland  there. 
O  dearest  sin!     O  sweet  abuse! 

One  worship  with  another  blent 
In  rapt  idolatry  too  tense 

For  Love's  relinquishment ! 

Mid  dainty  breviaries  rare, 

Dim  tapestries  of  cloudy  bloom, 
The  songless  lute,  the  silken  couch, 

Through  countless  midnight's  gloom 
She  watches  day  from  yesterday, 

In  pale  to-morrow's  fruitless  lure, 
While  none  beneath  the  high  White  stars 

Behold   her  vigils   pure. 

Religious  are  her  kindred  all, 

Blazoned  their  deed's  fidelity 
In  pride  sepulchral  on  their  stones, 

Devout  likewise  is  she ; 
By  white  resurgent  Easter  morns, 

The  scarlet  pomps  of  Whitsuntide, 
5 


GABRIELLE 

The  August  fetes,  the  purple  fasts 
Her  soul  is  sanctified. 


But  when  she  bows  her  at  High  Mass, 

Entranced  adores  the  lifted  Host, 
'Mid  crested  tombs  of  de  Latour  — 

He  is  her  Holier  Ghost. 
Unconscious  blasphemy  of  Love ! 

The  anguish  of  recovered  bliss 
Transcends  the  priestly  monotone, 

Enshrines  her  soul  in  His. 

His  touch  lights  torches  in  her  blood, 

This  groping  prayer  of  sense  is  His  — 
This  clutch  of  passion  on  her  throat  — 

This  suffocating  kiss  — 
And  dazed  she  sees  the  kneeling  throng 

And  on  her  stifled  breast  the  one 
Bright  blood  drop,  ravished  bold  from  some 

Rose  window  by  the  sun. 

For  celebrations  thus  profaned, 

No  luxury  of  chastisement 
She  spares  her  soft,  enamoured  flesh, 

On  grace  of  heaven  intent  — 
By  solemn  industries  of  soul, 

By  patient  ministries  of  hand, 
She  plays  her  role  of  chateleine 

Most  courteous,  most  bland. 
6 


GABRIELLE 

Though  Knight  and  Noble  find  her  fair 

None  can  her  Lover's  liege  beguile, 
Nor  is  there  harper's  string  more  sweet 

Than  accent  of  her  smile, 
Dispensing,  as  her  rank  befits, 

Her  Seigneur's  largess  in  his  stead, 
She  welcomes  all  unto  his  board, 

Her  heart  a  guestless  bed. 

Ah,  well  their  homage  sweeps  her  by, 

Light  as  a  May-bloom  careless  lain 
On  the  slow-flowing  river  Eure 

That  washes  her  domain; 
Within  the  cloister  of  her  soul 

None  breaks  the  reign  of  revery, 
Each  drowsy  hour  a  chaplet  for 

Her  ceaseless  litany. 

The  vassalage  of  Love  is  hers, 

The  lowly  love  of  Love  afar, 
The  love  of  rose  for  nightingale, 

The  love  of  star  for  star  — 
And  yet  despite  her  heart's  duress, 

So  blest  she  wears  her  Seigneur's  chain 
All  Love's  requited  lovers  seem 

But  meet  for  her  disdain. 

Her  mouth  for  wasted  pleasure  wan, 
And  famished  for  her  Lover's  vow, 
7 


GABRIELLE 

Her  senses  to  his  passion  sworn, 

His  seal  upon  her  brow, 
She  stretches  hands  that  never  reach, 

She  sees  her  fires  to  ashes  creep, 
The  snowflakes  wind  their  pall  o'er  one 

Who  sows  but  may  not  reap. 

The  poor  come  daily  for  her  dole, 

And  lavish  dole  she  never  spares, 
But  Jesus,  merciful,  perceives 

Her  need  more  sore  than  theirs 
Who  speak  her  thanks  with  ready  tongue, 

But  judge  her  heart  unpitying  — 
While  on  their  breasts  their  babes  lie  close 

As  vintage  tendrils  cling. 

Within  her  incense-laden  room 

Of  sacred  intimacies  fond, 
Amid  the  relics  of  themselves, 

Of  parting  and  of  bond  — 
Sorrow  and  Love  in  her  are  wed ; 

Long  soothing  nights  of  moonlight  dim 
Far  in  the  East  —  or  coming  near, 

She  wakes  and  waits  for  Him. 

Her  thoughts  are  sombre  as  the  rooks 
That  hover  dark  o'er  tower  and  sward, 

As  morning  red  salutes  her  cheek, 
Sole  greeting  from  her  Lord, 
8 


GABRIELLE 

And  though  returning  harvest  fills 
The  fragrant  bins  with  yellow  store, 

Still  up  the  glaring,  faithless  road 
Her  Joy  returns  no  more! 

When  Yuletide  blazes  on  the  hearth 

And  minstrels  wake  the  echoes  dumb, 
From  court,  from  cloister  and  crusade 

Her  kinsmen  hither  come, 
The  festal  flambeaux  gaily  flare 

Upon  their  Lady's  gentle  face, 
To  shudder  from  the  wraith  they  light 

Of  spectral  shadow  grace. 

Ten  years  of  pallid  Winter  days 

While  nests  lie  empty  neath  the  eaves, 
Ten  years  of  nights  of  loveless  sleep, 

Ten  years  of  other's  sheaves, 
From  out  her  turret  casement  pent 

She  sees  life  ebb  and  never  flow, 
Ere  Ronsard  to  his  Mistress  sung  — 

Slow  centuries  ago! 

The  mystic  lilies  in  the  close 

Than  Gabrielle  are  not  more  pale, 

Nor  fainting  moths  of  early  dusk 
Than  Gabrielle  more  frail, 

When  silver  nightingales  awake 
To  lyric  madness  of  the  Spring, 

9 


GABRIELLE 

\ 

For  sad  as  bud  of  barren  flower 
Her  hope's  false  bourgeoning. 

The  trembling  poplars  touch  the  stars 

Beyond  the  crenellated  wall, 
All  night  their  leaves  lie  whispering 

To  vex  her  in  their  thrall ; 
No  serenade  invites  her  sleep, 

No  dawn-song  warns  of  breaking  day, 
Despair  the  only  troubadour 

To  guard  her  postern  grey. 

The  plain  beneath  its  azure  dome 

Laughs  up  to  heaven,  laughs  up  and  sings 
But  veiled  are  her  romance-steeped  eyes 

To  blithe  external  things; 
To  fecund  earth  turned  by  the  plough  — 

The  eager  jonquil's  glad  brocade  — 
And  floating  odours  that  arise 

From  dappled  orchard  shade. 

For  while  relaxing  South  winds  sigh, 

To  sobbing  April  won  anew  — 
Dreams  are  her  waking, —  she  but  dreams 

Her  days  vague  visions  through; 
Fleet  as  the  gentle  Nicolette 

Speeding  to  Aucassin  amain, 
Her  fancies  coursing  down  the  night 

On  white  feet  of  the  rain. 
JO 


GABRIELLE 

She  sees  Him  slain, —  a  hero  proud, 

His  shield  encasing-  soul  of  flame, 
His  lance  the  curse  of  Saracens, 

Upon  His  lips  her  name  — 
Or  yet  she  dreams  Him  false  to  her, 

To  wake  distracted  for  her  fears 
Lest  Paradise  should  lack  for  Him 

Throughout  eternal   years. 

On  some  soft  breast  she  dreams  his  head, 

His  honour  pawned  to  sultry  charms, 
His  oath  foresworn,  his  love  betrayed 

In  slender  circling  arms; 
For  eyes  of  night  his  foe  forgot, 

Drunk  in  the  glories  of  dark  hair 
Unlike  gold  cornfields  of  la  Beauce  — 

Ah,  Gabrielle  was  fair! 

Or  does  Sleep  ope  with  glamoured  touch 

Her  fragile  caskets  of  the  past, 
And  bid  the  bridegroom  to  the  bride 

To  break  Love's  bitter  fast, 
Not  once  dead  rapture  turns  to  truth 

When  bugles  call  the  hunt  away, 
Nor  once  with  her  he  crosses  dawn 

To  mock  the  tyrant  day. 

But  sudden  piercing  through  her  swoon, 
Across  the  courtyard  rings  again 
ii 


GABRIELLE 

That  mailed  footfall,  save  in  sleep 

She  harkens  for  in  vain. 
Her  joy,  arch  rival  of  Doleur, 

Confronting  her  with  daring  eyes, 
Sends  her  blood  surging  in  her  ears 

As  harps  of  Paradise. 

Love,  Joy  and  Death  combat  for  her  — 

Ere  her  Seigneur  can  claim  his  own, 
Her  soul's  bright  star  breaks  down  the  sky, 

Escapes  its  orbit  lone; 
With  one  high  note  of  ecstasy 

The  jealous  angel  Azriel 
Sweeps  upward, —  bearing  on  his  breast 

Immortal  Gabrielle! 

L'Envio 

Prince,  if  my  ballad  of  dead  love 

Fall  o'er  you  cold  as  sifting  snow 
Ere  Ronsard  to  his  Mistress  sung  — 

Slow  centuries  ago, 
My  own  heart  kindles  envious, 

Howe'er  the  amorous  flesh  rebel  — 
To  clasp  in  death  Love's  endless  dream 

As  Golden  Gabrielle. 


12 


o 


A  WANDERER'S  SONG 

iNCE  more  to  see  familiar  stars 

Look  down  through  friendly  trees  — 
Once  more  to  feel  the  heart  of  youth 

With  May  across  the  seas! 
Once  more  to  see  the  hyacinth 

Press  upward  through  the  grass, 
To  hear  the  plough-boy's  tuneless  song 
Above  the  furrow  pass. 

—  In   dreams   the   willows    silver   along   the   rising 

streams, 

In  dreams  the  shining  valley  puts  on  her  Spring 
tide  gleams !  — 

Once  more  to  breathe  the  lilac  plumes 

In  gusts  of  April  rain  — 
To  linger  with  the  violets 

In  a  forgotten  lane; 
Once  more  to  reach  the  low  green  stile 

Upon  whose  gentle  sod, 
Those  earlier  travellers  said  farewell  — 

And  fared  them  forth  to  God. 

—  In  dreams  the  May-white  trances  the  nights  across 

the  sea, 

In  dreams  the  voice  of  Springtime  is  calling,  call 
ing  me !  — 

13 


A  WANDERER'S  SONG 

I'd  give  the  dawns  of  almond  bloom, 

The  orange  and  the  rose  — 
The  misty  olive  terraces 
Of  shadowy  repose  — 
I'd  give  the  nightingale  and  palm 
And  wander- joys  like  these  — 
Just  to  go  back  to  Spring's  old  throb 

And  old  infinities. 
-  In  dreams  my  heart  is  straying  with  May  across 

the  seas, 

In  dreams  my  heart  and  May  are  one  in  vagrant 
ecstacies ! — 


AUTRE  FOIS 

'  HP  IS  not  this  April  day  one  sees, 

Beguiled  the  way  of  orchard  trees 
'Neath  snows  of  bloom  and  starting  green  — 
Oh,  not  alone  this  Spring  I  ween! 
Nor  this  Spring's  birds  the  Lover  hears  — 
But  all  the  birds  of  other  years. 

Dimly   the   senses   apprehend  — 
The  amber  sunset's  fragrant  blend 
Of  buried  loves  and  dear  unrest, 
That  linger  in  the  blossomed  West  — 
As  ecstasy  of  Mays  long  flown 
To  lyric  heavens  of  their  own. 

Yet,  heart  of  Nature's  mystery! 
Within  each  budding  prophecy, 
Each  songful  miracle  of  dawn  — 
Faint  Springs  for  ever  passed  and  gone 
Look  back  at  us  with  April  eyes, 
From  memory's  green  paradise. 


GIPSYING 

"VTOUR  spirit  makes  a  wanderer  of  mine! 

I  cannot  choose  but  leave  my  hearth  and  go 

I  care  not  where  nor  how  — 
If  but  on  hill  or  sky  you  shine, 
At  pleasure  of  the  gipsy  wind 

Like  to  the  whirling  leaves  I  blow! 
I  cannot  choose  but  catch  your  hand  and  go. 

The  tenderness  of  yesterday  from  me 
Is  gone, —  the  poppy  drugs  of  passion  go, 

And  duties  that  were  dear; 
I  feel  a  tidal  ecstasy, 
The  savage  in  me  calls  —  I  hear 

My  mate  where  e'er  deep  waters  flow  — 
I  cannot  choose  but  listen  till  I  go. 

In  green  gold  glamours  of  the  early  Spring 
The  daffodils  are  dancing, —  I  must  go ! 

In  madrigals  of  flight 
The  sea  gull  in  me  now  takes  wing, 
The  morning  madness  blurs  my  sight, 

And  when  your  pagan  pipe  you  blow  — 
I  lock  my  life  awhile,  escape  and  go ! 


16 


THE  WIND 

JIT  E  sought  me  by  the  river  bank  and  on  the  moun- 

tainside, 
From  tallest  pines  he  swept  the  miles  of  frozen 

country  wide; 
He  would  not  whirl  with  merry  storms  or  rock  in 

empty  nests, 

Or  hide  in  drowsy  woods  till  dawn  —  his  troth  to 
human  quests. 

He  spurned  the  city's  narrow  streets  and  climbed  a 

sunless  wall 

To  lay  his  heart  of  solitude  against  my  window 
small. 

0  rugged  comrade  bleak  and   true!  —  no  blandish 

ment  is  thine, 

Yet  to  far  heights  of  distant  blue  thy  spirit  sum 
mons  mine. 

1  hear  thy  finger  at  the  pane,  thy  voice  entreating 

me  — 
A  snow-thatched  village  'neath  the  stars  my  eyes 

bewildered  see; 
My  heart  is  answer  to  thy  call  —  now  let  us  blow  and 

roam 
Above  the  city,  down  the  world  and  up  the  hills 

of  home! 

17 


ZAUBER-DUFT 

heart  but  fears  a  fragrance? 

Alien  they 

Who  breathe  in  the  white  lilac  only  May; 
For  there  be  other  spirits  unto  whom 
Fate's   kiss   lies   dreaming   in   each   stray   perfume! 

Who  mock  at  ghosts  of  odour  —  poor  they  be ! 
Bereft  the  scented  balms  of  memory, 
For  unto  one  in  April's  rain-blest  earth 
There  starts  for  aye  the  sharp,  glad  cry  of  birth; 
And  Love  will  find  in  rooms  unbarred  for  years 
Familiar  sweetness  loosing  sudden  tears, 
Clasping  the  will  in  mastering  embrace 
As  in  the  presence  of  a  phantom  grace. 

Then  there  be  odours  pungent  —  fires  in  Fall 
The  gipsying  of  boyhood  to  recall ; 
And  there  be  perfumes  holy  —  nay,  but  one 
Whose  pang  is  like  none  other  'neath  the  sun 
To  drown  the  sinking  senses  in  a  joy 
Beyond  all  time  to  weaken  or  destroy! 
Odours  there  be  that  swoon,  entreat,  caress  — 
Elusive  thrall,  to  doom  or  stab  or  bless ; 
Each  vagrant  scent  that  holds  the  breath  in  fee 
Doth  wed  the  heart  in  Life's  eternity. 

18 


ZAUBER-DUFT 

Who  fear  no  wraiths  of  fragrance  —  sorry  they  i 
Who  breathe  in  lilac  odours  only  May; 
For  there  be  other  mortals  unto  whom 
White  magic  wanders  in  each  stray  perfume. 


A  SONG  OF  SUMMER 

/^"OME  Amaryllis,  Phyllis  fair  — 

Chloe  and  Daphnis  fine, 
Come  Strephon  and  come  Corydon  — 

Let  a  smooth  reed  be  thine! 
Come  nymphs  and  fauns  and  satyrs  shy, 

And  revel  high  with  me  — 
For  Summer's  at  her  carnival 

And  bids  us  forth  to  see! 

Along  the  filmy  woodland  ways 

Pan  did  so  recent  pass, 
He  left  the  forest  trembling  yet, 

Laid  glamours  on  the  grass, 
There's  wild  magic  in  the  measure 

The  tricksy  shadows  dance, 
There's  a  lure  in  every  dingle  — 

A  hint  of  dalliance. 

Come  shepherds,  leave  your  bleating  charge 

And  follow  at  our  call, 
Out-fleet  the  stream's  soft  winding  course 

In  liege  to  Summer's  thrall; 
With  madrigal  and  triolet, 

With  reed  and  pipe  and  song  — 
With  rigaudon  and  phantasy 

Dance  on  in  happy  throng! 
30 


A  SONG  OF  SUMMER 

Come  deck  your  bodice  shepherdess 

With  aretheusa  pale, 
And  wind  your  locks  with  eglantine  — 

Let  ecstasy  prevail! 
With  jonquil  and  with  violet, 

Narcissus,  fleur  de  lis  — 
Be  garlanded  each  reveller 

Who  follows  Pan  with  me! 

Come,  crush  the  fern  with  careless  feet 

And  wide  all  durance  fling, 
Youth  fleeter  is  than  hoofs  of  Pan, 

And  Summer's  on  the  wing; 
Love,  mirth  and  joyance  claim  the  hour 

In  fragrant  roundelay  — 
For  Summer  holds  high  carnival 

And  Pan  has  passed  this  way! 


A  SUMMER  LETTER 

1~\EAR  Absent  Wanderer,  think  of  me 
•^"^     As  one  well  lost ;  content  to  be 
Lost  down  a  Summer  afternoon, 
Beyond  the  call  of  swift  or  soon ! 

Deep  down  a  heavy  dream  of  song —    , 
Haunting  the  hush  in  cadence  strong, 
With  heart-heard  voices  of  the  Spring, 
Along  the  silence  echoing. 

Deep  down  a  sultry  glamoured  glade, 
Where  musky  chestnut  trees  pervade 
With  far,  forgetful  sorcery  — 
From  out  their  white  veil's  mystery. 

Lost  down  a  Summer  afternoon 
Beyond  the  call  of  swift  or  soon, 
With  Hollyhocks  to  point  the  way  — 
Dear  Absent,  look  for  me  to-day! 

Tranced  in  a  daze  of  shadow  green, 
Whose  dusk  desires  embrace  and  lean 
With  hastening  step,  each  hour  increased, 
Forever  homeward  to  the  east. 

22 


A  SUMMER  LETTER 

One   with   the  breathless   beauty-gloom, 
Or  the  light  pleasure  of  the  breeze, 
One  with  the  sloth  of  sated  bees, 
Faint  in  the  hot  decay  of  bloom. 

Through  all  the  listless  leisure  sought 
By  no  stray  crier  save  thy  thought  — 
Beyond  the  call  of  swift  or  soon, 
Lost  down  a  Summer  afternoon! 


MIDSUMMER  NOON 

TV/T  IDSUMMER  noon ! 

For  one  brief  hour  Pan  sleeps  — 
And  Nature  marvelling  at  the  god's  release 
Stands   breathless   o'er   her    shaggy   deity, 
Lest  aught  dispel  the  beauty  of  his  dream. 
Pan  sleeps  — 

Let  shadows  veil  the  fervent  sun 
And   butterflies   on   honeyed   bosoms   swoon; 
Let  bees   in   nectars  deep  their  voices  drown, 
Nor  cry  of  colour  break  upon  the  hush ; 
The  fiercer  blooms   shall   calm  their   fevered   blood, 
Nor  falling  petal  stir  the  dusky  wood, 
And  birds  drop  songless  on  the  grassy  shade  — 
That  only  lulling  cadences  prevail. 
Pan  sleeps  — 

In  splendid  stupors  burns  the  noon; 
The  fountain  to  her  lilies  murmurs  on  — 
Finger  on  lip  doth  Nature  boding  lean 
Unto  the  leafy  covert,  where  at  ease 
Lies  lapped  in  silence  the  immortal  faun. 
Let  every  tender  avocation  cease! 

Save  running  water  that  shall  mystic  ward 
From  evil  potencies;  —  pause  laughing  breeze, 

24 


MIDSUMMER  NOON 

Nor  tease  the  forest  heart  at  your  caprice  — 
Nor  set  the  harebells  ringing  as  you  pass, 
Till  Pan  awakes  — 

Lifts  from  the  crumpled  fern 
His  tangled  locks  and  pipes  the  sylvan  strain 
That  calls  the  shepherd  to  his  errant  flocks, 
The  wilful  goatherd  from  his  mistress'  arms, 
And  bids  each  pastoral  energy  resume 
Its  August  ripening,  its  chaunt  of  growth. 
Upon  repose  no  longer  waits  the  noon! 

Resume  ye   forest    winds !     Ye  hasting  streams, 
Ye  fleecy  flocks  and  birds  and  scented  blooms ! 

Fountains  and  mortals. —  All, —  your  songs  resume ! 
Pan   wakes  — 

Again  through  glade  and  everglade, 
Through  sacred  grove  and  open  pasturage, 
His  fluting  reed  pipes  winsome  to  his  own 
Till  echo  harkens  for  his  wandering  tune. 


MIDSUMMER  WAVES 

\\7 E  are  turned  back  to  the  shore  in  blue  legions  — 
Here  to  sing  canticles  sparkling  and  praiseful. 
Here  to  exult  and  exalt  for  a  season. 
Sea    leagues    on    sea    leagues, —  from    caves    of    the 

coral  — 

Turning  from  vastness  and  bearing  strange  monsters, 
Our  shambling  caravans  come  with  their  burdens  — 
Pebbles  and  shells  dear  to  infantile  mortals. 

Here  we  sing  canticles  joyous  and  mirthful  — 
Voices  grown  hoarse  'mid  the  pitiless  surges, 
Spirits  bowed  down  to  your  sands  by  sore  labours ; 
Ridden  by  hurricanes  rending  asunder, 
Hurling  us  on  to  their  dooms  of  destruction, 
Winding  their  wrecks  in  reverberant  breakers. 
Dwelling  in  space  where  the  stars  rock  above  us, 
We  have  held  dawn  on  our  undulent  bosom ; 
Ours    are    the    deep    things, —  the    sea    graves    un 
numbered. 

We  are  turned  back  to  the  shore  for  a  season, 
Haunting  your  ears  with  the  dirge  of  mid-ocean, 
We  are  the  myriad  vassals  of  danger, 
We  are  the  derelict's  pilot  and  lover; 
Desperate  mariners  sigh  in  our  choirs  — 
Mariners  swept  from  the  shrouds  down  our  spirals ; 
We  have  seen  ships  steer  our  course  and  go  under  — 

26 


MIDSUMMER  WAVES 

Ours  are  the  songs  of  the  ocean's  pale  sirens. 

We  are  turned  back  to  the  shore  for  a  season, 

Here  to  allure  by  our  sinuous  splendour. 

We  chant  the  groves  drowned  deep  'neath  our  azure ; 

Gardens  of  wonder  un-trod  of  the  living, 

Passionless  Edens  eternally  flowing  — 

Cold  scentless  blossoms  that  live  in  our  being; 

Neither  the  sun  nor  the  moon  e'er  descending 

Green  fathoms  down  where  our  sea-beauties  tremble, 

Veiled  in  rare  seaweeds  and  lit  of  the  sea-gleam, — 

Vertical  sea-gleam  across  moving  waters. 

We  are  turned  back  in  the  languors  of  August, 
Cheering  the  weak  by  our  chorals  courageous. 
Cut  into  foam  where  the  jealous  crags  stay  us, 
We  are  the  homeless,  the  desolate  wand'rers, 
We  who  lift  Midsummer  canticles  thunderous  — 
Restless  and  wind-worn,  possessed  of  vague  demons, 
Peace  is  for  us  now  and  ever  receding, 
Hid  in  the  hollow  of  His  hand  that  poured  us 
Forth  from  tumultuous  whirlwind  and  chaos; 
Jubilant  witness  of  mighty  Jehovah! 


27 


THE  SPIDER'S  WEB 

T>  ETWEEN  the  harebell  and  the  grass 

At  Summer  dawn  it  hung, 
The  dew  lay  like  a  spangled  kiss, 

So  palpitant  it  swung: 
A  film  of  glamour  frosted  o'er, 

Rainbowed  by  passing  cloud  — 
As  breath  of  God  upon  the  morn, 

But  destined  for  a  shroud. 

His  fairy  canopy  out-spread, 

The  artisan  withdrew; 
Although  a  priest  of  beauty's  cult 

He  spun  a  lure,  he  knew. 
The  spider  loves  his  loomless  web 

As  poet  loves  his  art, 
He  wove  that  shining  thing  for  death, 

A  murderer  at  heart! 

Between  the  harebell  and  the  grass 

At  Summer  eve  it  swung, 
A  diagram  of  fatal  charm 

With  gauzy  victims  hung! 


28 


THE  RETURN 

T>  ACK  to  the  farm! 

•*•*     Where  the  Bob  White  still  is  calling 

As  in  remembered  dawnings  when  youth  and  I  were 
boys, 

Driving  the  cattle  where  the  meadow  brook  is  brawl 
ing 
Her  immemorial  wandering  fears  and  joys ! 

Home   to   the    farm    for  the   deep   green   calms   of 

Summer, 
Life    of    the    open    furrow  —  life    of   the   waving 

grain  — 

Leaving  the  painted  world  of  masquerade  and  mum 
mer 
Just  for  the  sense  of  earth  and  ripening  again! 

Down  in  the  hayfield  where  scythes  glint  through 

the  clover; 
Lusty  blood  a-throbbing  in  the  splendour  of  the 

noon  — 

Lying  mid  the  haycocks  as  castling  clouds  pass  over, 
Hearing  insect  lovers  a-piping  out  of  tune. 

Caught  in  the  spell  of  old  kitchen  garden  savours  — 
In  luscious  lines  retreating  to  slopes  of  musky  corn 
29 


THE  RETURN 

And   clambouring  grapes   that   spill   their   clustering 

flavours, — 
Each  in  fragrant  season  filling  plenty's  golden  horn. 

Off  to  the  wood  lot  where  briar  bloom  runs  riot 
And  wary   forest  creature  no  hunter's  snare  de 
ceives, 
Where    virgin   growth   beguiles    the    solemn-hearted 

quiet 

With  songs  of  Winter  fires  a-ripple  through  the 
leaves. 

Up  to  the  bars  in  the  twilight's  soft  reaction  — 
Winding  through  the  ferny  lanes  to  barns  of  stoop 
ing  eaves 

Welcoming  at  nightfall  to  simple  satisfaction, 
When    the    reeling    swallow    her    dusky    pattern 
weaves. 

Out  in  the  dews  with  the  spider  at  his  shuttle  — 
In  that  half  dreaming  hour  that  awakes  the  whip- 
poorwill 

And  sets  the  night  hawk  darting  sinister  and  subtle, 
E'er  the  full  moon  complacent  loiters  o'er  the  hill. 

Back  to  the  farm! 

With  the  friendly  brute  for  neighbour, 
Where  youth  and  Nature  beckon,  the  tryst  who  would 

not  keep? 

Back  to  the  luxury  of  rest  that  follows  labour, 
Back  to  the  primal  joys  of  hunger  and  of  sleep  I 

30 


TO  A  MOUNTAIN  LAKE 

LAKE  within  thy  clasping  hills, 

E'en  so  a  woman  shadows  forth  her  Love! 
Fond  to  reflect  each  ecstasy  that  fills 
The  hours  of  gold ;  or  bows  that  arch  above 
The  waning  tempest,  to  the  calm  that  stills. 

Oft  hast  thou  trembled,  swift  o'er  swept 
By  gusts  of  passion  whirling  over  thee; 

Into  thy  heart  regretful  rains  have  swept; 
Thy  leaden  greyness  or  thy  phantasy 
Thy  sky-born  impress  of  thy  Lover  kept  I 

And  most  I  love  thee,  when  at  rest, 
All  through  the  starry  vigils  of  the  night 

Thou  bearest  the  young  moon  upon  thy  breast, 
Cradled  in  broken  ripples  of  delight. 


WAITING  FOR  THE  STAGE 

'T^HE  evening  wind  is  waking  in  the  Elms, 

Unto  the  whippoorwill  the  thrush  gives  o'er, 
The  hooded  roads  from  twilight  long  withdrawn 
Back  to  their  dim  communing  turn  once  more. 

Players  at  quoits  forsake  the  dusty  road 
And  drift  to  haven  at  the  village  store, 

On  whose  worn  steps  an  idler  carves  his  name 
'Mid  interlaced  initials  cut  of  yore. 

Nor  flock  nor  kine  bespeak  an  evening  care, 

The  labourer  may  let  his  vigils  fall 
And  take  his  ease  mid  gallant  sparks  a  while  — 

So  well  the  hour  makes  consorts  of  them  all. 

Here,  while  the  farmer  talks  of  future  crops, 
Predicts  a  drought  or  drones  of  early  blight, — 

Some  country  bumpkin  airs  his  prowess  bold, 
Or  some  pugnacious  bully  offers  fight; 

The  schoolmaster  oft  cracks  his  fabled  joke, 
On  vying  with  the  local  wit  intent, — 

And  flitting  past  as  moths, —  the  village  maids, 
Bashful  by  nature  and  admonishment. 
32 


WAITING  FOR  THE  STAGE 

Oft  doth  a  hillside  neighbour,  drawing  rein 

For  trifling  barter,  glib  a  wager  lay 
Twixt  yon  grey  Dobbin  and  his  "  Three-year-old " ; 

A  hurried  child  forgets  his  jug  to  stay. 

Nor  venerable  sage  nor  swain  new-wed, 
However  may  his  rustic  ardour  burn, — 

However  fond  besought  to  hasten  home, 
Once  lingering,  effect  a  swift  return. 

Both  church  and  state  an  ample  rostrum  find, 

No  party  ever  lacks  for  advocate, 
Nor  gentle  gossip  loses  savour  rare, 

Exchanged  by  weary  cronies  as  they  wait. 

i 
Ah !  theirs  a  ripe  though  rude  philosophy  — 

Nor  fear  nor  avarice  mar  their  content, 
Who  seeking  nothing,  find  the  joy  they  crave, 
Impartial  waiting  on  the  near  event. 

How  jovial  the  hour  that  tops  their  day ! 

What  jests  are  made,  what  memories  restored, 
What  hot  discussions  waged,  what  tales  retold, 

What  shrewd  surmise  and  mysteries  explored ! 

Now  from  the  cottage  eaves  a  fainting  beam 

Sends  forth  a  final  sleep-inviting  sign, 
As  from  the  belfry  of  the  meeting  house, 

Tolls  ominous  the  warning  hour  of  nine. 
33 


WAITING  FOR  THE  STAGE 

Soon,  with  a  jolting  swagger  o'er  the  stones, 
The  distant  sound  of  wheels  their  charm  repeat, 

And  o'er  the  hilltop  looms  the  stage  at  last ! 
To  rattle  reckless  down  the  silent  street  — 

Draw  up  a  flourish  in  the  square  of  light 

Framed  by  the  open  door, —  the  whip  lash  curled 

Once  more  across  the  leader's  reeking  flanks, 
To  herald  wide  this  envoy  from  the  World ! 

Since  boyhood  days  I've  seen  the  liners  brave 
Plough  up  the  Bay  at  home, —  across  the  sands 

Spent  caravans  wind  in  at  close  of  day ; 
Received  strange  convoys  oft  in  lonely  lands ; 

Yet  never  have  I  felt  the  World  draw  near, 
Its  great  uncertainties  my  fate  engage, 

As  when  there  lumbered  sudden  through  the  dusk 
That  peradventure  of  the  evening  stage! 


34 


F  old  the  Summer  crept  on  noiseless  wing, 

As  if  by  stealth  toward  Autumn  turned  her  face, 
This  year  she  makes  no  secret  of  her  haste  — 
Speeds  her  successive  pageantry  apace. 

Glad  years  when  at  October's  fruitful  stile 
Your  feet  to  meet  my  own  were  turning  true, 

How  bloom  and  tedious  vintage  held  me  back 
From  days  of  golden  reaping,  love  and  you ! 

But  now  —  when  parting  only  waits  us  there, 
Both  hasting  bird  and  changeful  flower  conspire 

To  speed  us  to  the  jocund  harvest  moon 
Of  old  out-lived  but  not  out-loved  desire. 

Too  swift  the  briar  rose  gave  o'er, —  too  soon, 
Too  soon  the  ripening  grape  upon  the  vine ! 

Scarce  did  the  lily  star  the  sultry  pool 
When  roadsides  purpled  with  the  aster's  sign. 

Turn  back,  repent  your  steps  of  radiant  bloom, 

Your  green  assemblage  turn !     Give  back  those  slow 

Interminable  days  of  Summers  past, 
When  hope,  remote  but  sure,  had  far  to  go ! 
35 


AT  SUMMER'S  END 

Too  brief  across  the  sun  dial  leans  the  sun, 
The  lisping  birds  are  prescient  of  their  flight 

Ere  scarce,  it  seems,  they  tumbled  from  the  nest ; 
And  bolder  dares  the  cricket  taunt  the  night. 

Each  laggard  of  old  Summers  spurs  us  on  — 
Too  early  creeps  the  dusk,  the  shortening  days 

Wane  paler  toward  the  fateful  hour,  for  hearts 
Whose  beat  is  doomed  at  parting  of  the  ways. 


IN  AUTUMN  RAIN 

spirit  is  it  calling  in  the  Autumn  rain, 
That  bids  me  cast  my  needle  by,  set  wide  the 

door? 

The  day  is  troubled  with  its  voice  and  on  the  path 
The  footfall  of  the  dead  that  come  no  more. 

To  reminiscent  languors  now  the  gardens  yield, 

In  Spring  they  ardent  press  —  in  Fall  resigned  they 

know 
They  have  fulfilled  the  fate  of  Summer  —  now  to  sleep 

Beneath  the  lullaby  of  winds  that  strow 
The  drifting  yellow  leaves  from  unresisting  trees, 

To  weave  in  mellow  strands  along  the  lane  and  street 
Vague  Moorish  patterns  of  forgotten  suns  and  rains, 

A  golden  tapestry  for  Autumn's  feet. 

Well  hath  the  Spring  a  throbbing  fever  of  her  own, 

Waking  and  breaking  from  reluctant  thralls  in  vain, 
Since  all  her  prophecy  at  last  is  lulled  to  peace 

In  Nature's  sure  narcotic,  Autumn  rain. 
O  guest  beloved  of  my  heart  and  wailing  wind, 

For  you  I  light  the  hearth,  entreat  your  will  its  way, 
Pile  high  the  cones  and  hesitate  —  perchance 

That  haunting  spirit  o'er  my  sill  should  stray ! 


37 


IN  AUTUMN  RAIN 

Let  us  elude  to-night  the  intervening  drear, 
While  in  the  leaping  flame  hope's  drooping  pinions 
thrill, 

Until  as  Southing  birds  we  cry,  "  'Tis  but  a  sleep, 
Ere  April  call  us  by  the  daffodil !  " 


A   LL  through  the  Summer  days  I  tranquil  lay, 
*^          Filled  to  the  lips  with  utter  peace  and  rest  — 
The  warm,  sweet,  slumberous  breezes  did  not  stir 

The  stark  hands  folded  weary  on  my  breast; 
All  through  the  Summer  nights  I  loved  to  dream, 

While  moonlight  wove  a  ghost-lore  on  my  grass, 
Nor  longed  for  dawn  nor  any  restless  change  — 

Nor  that  this  trance  of  Summer  death  should  pass. 

But  now  the  Autumn  stands  with  lifted  horn 

To  call  the  hunter  and  the  wild  things  all, 
My  satin  ceiling  cramps  me, —  I  would  forth ! 

Were  there  a  door  set  in  my  narrow  wall. 
O  Nature,  free  this  prisoned  child  of  thine ! 

Rest  irksome  grows  and  heaven  from  earth  too  far  — 
Bid  me  come  back  to  wander  in  the  rain, 

Or  shine  at  nightfall  in  the  first  faint  star ! 

Call  me  to  mingle  with  the  valley  mists 
That  cling  about  the  hills  when  harvest  wanes, 

Or  lie  in  sunshine  'neath  old  cottage  eaves, 
Or  shine  in  cresting  cornfields  on  the  plains; 

Let  me  sing  seaward  in  the  rising  streams, 
Fumble  my  wonted  latch  in  wistful  wind  — 

39 


THE  DEAD  HUNTER 

Let  me  arise  in  colour's  leaping  flame, 
Or  brief  renewal  in  the  gentian  find ! 

Help  me  elude  this  guarding  monument 
That  prates  my  peace  in  eulogistic  strain, 

When  Autumn  sounds  her  scarlet  reveille 
The  hunter's  heart  harks  back  to  life  again ! 


NOVEMBER  DUSK 

T  T  PON  a  ridge  of  distant  pasture  height 

Merged  in  the  symphony  of  coming  night, 

'Mid  chords  and  multichords  of  muffling  haze, 
Through  furze  and  gorse  the  darkness  deeper  wades 
O'er  dim  receding  glades  and  everglades, 

Whose  outlines  faint  elude  the  wistful  gaze. 

In  sylvan  dreams  the  forest  Lovers  lie, 
Only  a  wraith  of  smoke  against  the  sky 

Hints  of  the  valley's  humble  cottage  cheer, 
A  baying  hound  —  a  child's  voice  sweet  and  shrill; 
As  tides  of  ocean  flooding  up  the  hill 

The  wines  of  sleep  and  purple  stupors  near. 

Cut  off  from  day's  realities  —  the  past 
Blurred  by  soft  opiates  of  dusk  —  at  last 

Intimate  darkness  fills  our  empty  palms! 
Those  groping  hands  that  seek  and  dare  not  claim. 
Nirvana's  peace  prevails ;  the  mounting  flame 

Of  Self  bowed  'neath  the  Angelus  of  calms. 

Till  sudden  o'er  us  breaks  a  cry  of  flight  — 
The  train !    The  train ! 

And  passioning  cities  within  reach  to-night! 


IN  JANUARY 

A   CROSS   the   night,    sifting  through   gaunt   pine 

branches, 

Peering  for  lovers,  youth,  old  Junes,  o'er  soon  — 
Down  icy  paths,  past  rose-beds  deep  in  snowdrift 
Over  the  sleeping  garden  strays  the  moon. 

The  lilies  do  not  heed  the  silver  signal, 

Nor  do  the  roses  breathe  back  bliss  for  bliss, 

And  yet  no  mourner  at  a  sweetheart's  graveside, 
Nor  lover  at  a  lady's  casement  this. 

The  silence  deepens ;  to  its  chosen  altars 
The  light  in  wonder  as  a  spell  descends, 

No  husky  fountain  lifts  a  sweet  rejoinder  — 
Nor  bloom  nor  fragrance  on  this  step  attends. 

Faint  buds  of  Spring  lie  'neath  their  dazzling  hillocks, 
Deep  dreaming  of  young  April's  crescent  frail; 

Nor  moth  nor  firefly  ply  their  amorous  traffic 
Nought  wakes  within  this  frozen  vigil  pale. 

Aye  there  is  one, —  that  soft  her  prey  is  stalking, 
Stealthy  as  Zero's  kiss  upon  the  pane  — 

Through  her  set  teeth  the  hungry  wind  is  sighing, 
Nor  doth  she  follow  on  the  moon  in  vain. 
42 


IN  JANUARY 

"Tis    the    white    Were-wolf    shambles    through    the 
shadow, 

Follows  the  moon  with  ^Etna  in  her  eyes ; 
Now  "  in  the  wolf's  month  "  down  the  night  deserted, 

Only  brute  and  planet  share  the  earth  and  skies. 


43 


REVOLT 

C  HE  turned  from  her  hearth  and  its  fires  forsaking 

Fled  wild  to  Nature  —  a  mortal  escaping! 
To  lose  human  passion,  her  hot  heart  freeing  — 
With  Wind  and  River  to  merge  her  being. 

O  Wind  I  am  come!     O  circling  Water! 
A  loveless  Pagan,  behold  your  daughter ! 
My  lips  are  weary  of  languorous  kisses, 

My  shoulders  are  burdened  by  arms  that  cling, 
The  fetters  of  Love  are  irksome  blisses  — 
I  weep  and  tremble  when  I  would  sing ! 

Let  me  race  high  with  your  gusty  huntsmen 

Coursing  tall  tree-tops  the  long  night  through; 
Let  me  dance  glad  with  the  clamorous  torrent, 

Veiled  in  the  mists  of  her  rainbow  dew ! 
My  outstretched  arms, —  you  will  never  bind  them ! 

My  wandering  feet  you  will  never  snare! 
My  heart  you  will  never  freight  with  sorrow  — 

My  eyes  you  will  never  dim  with  care. 

O  Wind  I  am  come!     O  circling  Water! 
O  Pagan  Mother,  receive  your  daughter ! 
My  eyes  are  holden  by  mortal  weeping, 
And  my  heart  rebels  at  its  own  desire; 

My  dreams  are  thrall  to  a  Lover's  keeping  — 
My  life  consumes  in  a  wasting  fire! 
44 


REVOLT 

But  the  Winds  blew  Northward  and  did  not  heed  her, 
Hallooing  hard  on  the  track  of  the  leader  — 

The  Torrent  sped  on  to  its  flooding  river, 
Mocking  aloud  through  shine  and  shiver  — 

"  Turn  back !    Turn  back  from  this  shrineless  portal ! 
Nature  is  fair  but  Love  is  immortal ! 

The  sky  has  its  stars  and  gods  above  you, 
The  blossom  must  bloom  and  the  bird  must 

fly- 

You  may  not  venture  with  Wind  and  Water, 
Turn  home  sad  mortal,  with  Love  to  lie !  " 


THE  POET'S  INTERLUDE 

Nature  is  sibylline,  timeless  and  heartless, 
Her  hand  lies  hard  as  a  primal  law, 
Though  immemorial  beings  entreat  her, 
Her  suns  appear  and  her  moons  withdraw. 

The  prescience  of  Autumn,  the  April's  trouble, 
Vanishing  fragrance,  wings  that  hover  — 
What  are  they  more  than  illumined  transcription, 
Varying  mood  of  a  mortal  Lover? 


45 


REVOLT 

Love  is  the  longing  of  purple  shadow, 
Love  is  the  glamour  of  golden  grain, 

Love  is  the  might  of  the  trampling  tempest, 
Love  is  the  call  of  the  wander-rain! 

Though  you  fain  rebel  and  elude  with  Nature, 
In  vain  her  sorceries  'reft  of  this, 
Her  luring  wild  and  her  wantoning  joyance 
Fade  at  the  brink  of  a  mortal  kiss. 

Crimson  of  coppice  and  russet  of  dingle 
Falter  or  flame  by  Love's  furtive  grace, 
Dreamless  the  stile  in  the  silvering  moonbeam 
Till  Love's  light  crossing  to  Love's  embrace. 

Love  is  the  instinct  of  brooding  nightfall, 
Love  is  where  Westering  wood-paths  lead, 
Love  is  the  star  on  the  flushed  horizon 
Thrilling  the  sense  with  a  mystic  need! 

Nature  is  magical,  wayward,  elusive  — 
Her  goals  set  far  beyond  man's  scant  hour, 
But  the  human  touch  to  the  wistful  human 
Transcends  the  mark  of  her  fateful  power. 

What  beauty  lurks  in  her  smile  to  challenge 
The  curving  lips  for  Love's  wine  out-thrust? 
Drink  and  forget  in  the  cup  of  your  Lover  — 
Human  to  human  as  dust  to  dust ! 


Then  the  Wind  shouted  high,  "  I  ride  forever !  " 
The  Stream  replied,  "  I  run  to  my  river ! " 
"  Impotent  arms  you  will  open  —  to  stay  us  — 
Our  rapture  shall  never  tarry  or  bide, 

Sleep  if  you  will  in  our  loveless  chambers  — 
Of   sweet-mouthed  mortals   your   dreams 
betide ! " 

She  fled  the  forest  —  her  deft  feet  escaping 
Turned  to  her  hearthstone,  her  folly  forsaking; 
To  claim  the  immortal,  her  passion  freeing  — 
In  the  cup  of  her  Lover  to  lose  her  being; 
Her  lips  turned  faint  for  his  languorous  kisses, 
Her  slight  arms  fain  for  his  arms  that  cling, 
Her  hands  outstretched  to  claim  her  fetters  — 
To  weep  and  tremble  nor  care  to  sing. 


47 


TO-NIGHT 

<  *COMETIME  —  but  not  to-night  —  sometime," 

My  heart  as  roses  bowed  by  rain 
At  cadence  of  that  slow  refrain, 
That  tremulous,  impassioned  rhyme, 
"  Sometime  —  dear   Love,   sometime." 

To-night,  dear  doubt  of  Love,  to-night! 
Aye,  garnered  roses  fade,  I  know  — 
Yet  those  ungarnered  bloom  and  go 
Pale  and  forgotten  from  thy  sight, 
To-night  —  dear  doubt  of  Love,  to-night ! 

"  Sometime  —  dear  joy  of  Love  —  sometime  " 
Thine  eyes  that  kiss  my  soul  to-night 
With  spirit  kisses,  hot  and  white, 

Will  close  to  love,  be  blind  to  rhyme  — 
"Sometime  —  dear  joy  of  Love,  sometime." 

To-night  —  O  Love  we  have  to-night ! 
Make  sure  the  lock  of  heaven's  gate 

Within  thine  arms,  ere  'tis  too  late ! 

Love  may  a  rover  be  at  light  — 

To-night,  dear  dream  of  Love,  to-night  1 


M 


CHILD  OF  EARTH 

Y  father  was  an  Anchorite 
His  soul  to  me  he  gave ; 
My  mother  was  a  Zingara, 

Light  as  the  dancing  wave. 
The    mystic    vision    starward    turned  —  my    father's 

legacy ; 

The  scarlet  passion's  vagrant  lure  —  my  mother  calling 
free. 

Within  my  cell  I  hear  her  song; 

Within  my  lover's  arms 
I  hear  the  prayers  my  father  said 

To  ward  from  evil  charms. 
My  father's  voice  cuts  through  the  dark  and  lights  a 

pathway  home; 

My  mother's  laugh  rings  down  the  world,  and  hearing, 
—  I  must  roam. 

Poor  haunted  mortal,  thus  to  be 
Possessed  of  natures  twain  — 
A  gipsy  heart,  a  monkish  soul, 

In  conflict  hot  and  vain ! 
My  father's  lineage  was  proud;  stern  Duty  was  his 

name. 

My  mother  men  called  Pleasure;  —  none  cared  from 
whom  she  came! 

49 


IN  FAREWELL 

V\7HITE  is  my  colour, 

Think  of  me 

'Mid  snows  of  Winter;  unto  thee 
The  faint  white  lilacs  breathe  me  yet, 
The  white  rose  and  white  violet 
Forbid  thy  senses  to  forget ! 

White  is  my  colour, 

May  it  be 

A  pledge  of  nearness  unto  thee ! 
When  the  white  falcon  seeks  thy  wrist, 
When  thy  white  charger  wins  the  list ; 
Aye,  and  when  on  thy  bended  knee 
The  sacrament  hath  shriven  thee, 
Say  one  white,  silent  prayer  for  me! 


HIS  APPEAL 

/^  IVE  me  your  weariest  hours 

When  the  tides  of  life  ebb  low, 
Give  me  the  hopeless  moments 
When  the  light  seems  near  to  go. 

Come  to  me  in  temptation  — 

Ah,  never  I  bid  you,  Sweet, 
When  life  is  glad  or  glorious 

And  the  roses  kiss  your'  feet ! 

Others  may  drink  of  your  triumphs 
And  garner  your  laurels  green, 

Mine  be  the  love  enfolding 
In  weakness  and  pain  unseen. 

Why  should  you  feign  to  spare  me 
With  your  smile  that  cheats  the  years 

When  my  heart  finds  all  its  heaven 
In  the  shadow  of  your  tears  ? 


AT  LAST 

ISS  down  my  eyes  — 

lest  they  should  wake 
Upon  the  vine  shade  of  my  village  wall ; 
Lest  as  in  parted  dawns  the  slow  day  break, 
And  heartless  pleasures,  weary  duties  call ! 

Kiss  down  my  eyes  — 

lest  far  from  thee 

Along  some  luring,  unsuspected  way, 
A  new  delight  or  glory-flash  I  see, 
This  one  impassioned  blindness  to  betray. 

Then  cease  to  kiss  — 

that  I  my  eyes 

May  raise  to  thine  and  know  the  past  is  past ; 
Beyond  the  tyranny  of  waking  lies 
Our  love's  far  dreamland-kingdom  —  won  at  last ! 


OUR  SECRET 

"VTOUR  voice,  to  me  is  like  the  fountain  fall 
In  some  sequestered  courtyard,  overbid 
With  flowers  of  pomegranates  burning  red  — 
Where  rhythmic  waters  ceaseless  calm  and  call. 

Your  glance,  to  me  is  like  a  restless  star  — 
The  instant  ere  it  stakes  its  light  on  space, 

To  reel  as  some  wild  centaur  from  its  place, 
Past  steadfast  orbs  enchained  to  heaven's  car. 

To  me,  your  touch  —  ah,  no,  to  all  save  me 
Let  that  remain  beneath  pomegranates  red  — 

In  that  dim  courtyard  with  the  fountain  hid, 
A  listless  languor  of  the  memory! 


53 


MIGNONETTE 

\\fHEN  I  am  dead  — 

My  heart  turned  back  to  dust, 
All  that  was  dear  to  you  in  me  will  rise 

Forever  in  the  mignonette  we  loved; 
When  I  am  dead  —  beyond  the  Spring's  surprise. 

i 
When  wistful  suns 

Ravish  this  fragrant  bloom 
With  one  gold  throe  of  sensuous  ecstasy, 

As  light  that  shivers  deep  'neath  moving  waves 
Something  in  you  will  stir,  for  sake  of  me, — 

And  though  my  heart  be  dust,  my  soul  will  smile, 
And  you  will  sigh  for  Paradise  the  while. 
Would  I  were  dead ! 


THE  SONG  OF  A  SLAVE  TO  HER  MASTER 

\\T  ITHIN  the  courtyard,  Master  mine, 

Give  me  one  little  fountain  glad, 
To  be,  for  Joy  when  I  repine  — 
The  sister  that  I  never  had ; 

To  play  with  me  when  you  are  far  — 
To  chatter  in  my  native  tongue  — 

Yours  is  a  high  and  distant  star, 
Dear  Master,  I  am  young! 

One  little  fountain  ever  gay, 

To  sing  the  song  of  vanished  birds, 

To  break  the  silence  of  the  day 
When  you  forget  to  love  in  words. 


55 


ONE  DAY 

T_J  E  taught  her  a  whole  world  of  needs 

In  one  short  day ; 

As  one  man  to  one  woman  may  — 
A  need  of  daring  and  of  deeds, 
A  need  of  crowns  to  lay  beneath 

His  hero  feet. 

A  need  of  tender  fragrance  sweet, 
And  fame  to  offer  as  a  wreath ; 
Of  joy  all  overpowering, — 

Of  pain,  to  prove 
Enduring  masteries  of  love. 
A  need  of  higher  notes  to  sing, 
A  need  of  heaven  and  of  truth; 

Strong  hands  to  guide, 
And  braver  footsteps  by  her  side 
Across  the  day  —  aye  and  forsooth 
A  need  of  covert  for  her  weary  wings  — 

The  need  one  man  unto  one  woman  brings. 


A  LAST  FAVOUR 

CPEAK  lower  —  do  not  wake 

This  hurrying  heart  of  mine 
That  ailed  the  livelong  day, 

And  listening  tense  for  thine, 
Remembered  scarce  to  beat ! 

Step  ghostlier  —  do  not  stir 
Forgotten  miseries 

Come  thou  no  nearer  her. 

Still,  and  appeased  at  last, 

By  every  sign  she  sleeps  — 
Forsaken  of  desire. 

Alas,  the  slumbering  deeps 
Will  tremble  'neath  thy  voice  — 

Thy  faintest  whispering  break 
Her  calm's  frail  barrier. 

Ah,  go !  she  shall  not  wake ! 


57 


A  SONG  OF  AFTERWARD 

T  SLEW  her  heart  with  kisses 
And  tossed  her  soul  away  — 
I  balmed  her  sleep  in  blisses, 

Lest  dreams  from  love  betray ; 
I  wound  her  in  a  shroud  of  song 

Lest  pain  her  path  forget  — 
And  all  the  empty  hours  along, 

With  snares  of  fragrance  set. 

Her  ghost  rose  Queen  of  kisses 

To  haunt  my  life  away  — 
Throughout  all  newer  blisses 

Her  phantom  doth  betray ; 
And  now  I  make  her  dirge  in  deeds 

Of  other  women's  wrong, 
Nor  angels  heed  what  anguish  bleeds 

In  the  blasphemer's  song ! 


THE  CONVICTS 

'T1  HUS  spake  an  artist,  riding  idly  where 

A  chain  gang  breaking  stones  upon  the  road, 
Compelled  his  heart  from  comrades  brave  and  fair 
To  closer  study  of  the  penal  code: 
"  Your  brow  is  sullen  and  your  life  a  curse, 
From  sin  ye  came  and  innate  evil  bear, — 
But,  brother,  I  who  ride  and  laugh,  do  worse 
Than  you  who  toil  in  open  sentence  there ! 
I  drag  a  chain  self- forged ;  nay,  'tis  no  jest, 
Yonder  she  waits, —  the  wife,  whose  silken  pace 
Dwarfs  my  man's  stride  to  crawl  at  her  behest, 
While  mated  weaklings  pass  me  in  the  race." 


59 


AN  INCIDENT 

A  S  twilight  lay  upon  the  sea, 

A  sombre  priest  once  strayed 
Where  idle  groups  of  worldlings  throng 
In  vanity's  parade. 

And  when  his  habit  faint  across 

My  lady's  velvet  swept, 
A  flash  of  longing  for  the  world 

Across  his  conscience  crept. 

My  lady's  glance  fell  on  his  face, 
Bent  prayerful  o'er  his  book  — 

A  flash  of  envy  for  his  peace 
Her  inmost  being  shook. 

Both  went  their  way  all  unaware 

Of  what  had  each  befell  — 
Within  his  soul  a  stray  desire, 

Within  her  heart  a  cell ! 


60 


AN  ALLEGORY 

A  BOVE  —  the  Eiger  rose  in  clouds  of  snow, 
^^     The  death  gorge  of  the  ice  crevasse  below ; 
Aware  of  crumbling  terror  'neath  his  feet, 
He  staggered  back, —  miraculous  retreat  — 
Safe,  on  the  rugged  rocks  of  certainty! 
Then  in  a  swift  reactive  bravery, 
He  faltered  near  —  one  flower  allured  so  fair 
That  clung  beneath  the  ledge  in  dizzy  air, 
One  crimson  flower  blooming  amid  the  frost  — 
And  seeing  her,  he  tottered,  and  was  lost. 

Unmoved,  the  Eiger  pointed  to  the  sky, 
Below  the  silent  glacier  gave  no  sigh ; 
The  sweet  and  evil  flower  bloomed  on ;  afar 
Hell  burned  the  brighter  for  a  fallen  star ! 


61 


ANY  MAN  TO  ANY  WOMAN 

\\7 HAT  will  you  make  of  me ? 

A  lawless  Lover. 

True  to  the  blood  that  runs  in  errant  veins? 
Another  Antony  betraying  kingdoms? 
An  Abelard,  whose  crimson  passion  stains 
A  sacred  vow  ?     Or  yet  the  flawless  hero, 
As  Parsifal  eluding  Venus'  arms  — 
Visioned  beyond  men's  lower  satisfactions? 
Some  Petrarch  singing  whitely  of  your  charms? 

We  are  a  little  lower  than  the  angels, 

But  hid  within  us  all  the  gods  abide, 

For  you  the  sword  is  drawn,  for  you  dishonoured, 

Faithful  or  faithless  you  at  last  decide. 

You  are  the  Circe  of  our  every  power, 

You  are  the  fire  alike  to  blood  and  brain, 

Call  us,  Oh,  Heart  of  Woman !     Call  your  bond-men ! 

When  have  your  signals  flashed  to  us  in  vain  ? 


ANY  WOMAN  TO  ANY  MAN 


will  you  make  of  me? 
A  shining  Helen 
Lit  by  Troy's  blazing  towers?     Some  pale  Camille 
Dead  of  vain  love?    Or  does  the  phantom  Laura 
Unto  your  lyric  phantasy  appeal? 
Would  you  but  seek  me  for  a  pretty  pastime, 
To  dance  the  hours  away  in  pleasure's  lead? 
Or  does  a  nobler  vision  claim  your  worship  — 
Mother  of  Men  thrill  your  diviner  need  ? 

Faint  lies  our  star  beneath  the  far  horizon, 
Until  you  curse  or  bless  it  into  flame, 
Empress  or  Angel,  Magdalen,  Madonna 
Await  your  christening  voice  of  pride  or  shame. 
Call  us  to  kingdoms,  martyrdom  or  passion, 
We  are  the  answer  to  your  inmost  prayer  — 
There  are  no  depths  for  you  we  have  not  fallen, 
There  are  no  heavens  too  high  for  us  to  share  ! 


THROUGH  THE  IVORY  GATE 

fT*HERE  are  two  gates  of    dream  —  the  Ivory 
Gate  is  that  through  which  unrealized  visions 
pass." 


I 

IN  A  MOON-COLOURED  GARDEN 

V\7HY  do  you  stand  where  the  Virgin  lilies 

Lift  their  souls  upon  midnight  space? 
What  is  the  spell  of  their  moon-lit  silence? 
A  face  —  only  a  face. 

Why  do  you  shiver  where  crimson  roses 
Yield  their  hearts  in  the  noontide  glow? 

Theirs  is  the  sign  betwixt  love  and  slumber 
On  lips  I  used  to  know. 

Why  do  you  wait  in  the  bronze-green  twilight 
When  restless-footed  dancers  pair? 

I  wait  for  my  dream  with  the  dark  returning  - 
A  heaven  of  dusky  hair. 


II 

A  DREAM  OF  FIRST  APPEARING 

A   LL  night  I  wandered  down  a  way 

Familiar  to  old  dreams, —  yet  vague  estranged 
Through  dread  of  where  that  sloping  path  might  lead. 
The  trees  arched  friendly,  waters  sang  unchanged 
Till  currents  widened  and  my  trouble  grew  — 
The  light  seemed  spent,  the  shadow  closer  fell, 
There  was  no  bridge  to  span  the  rising  flood, 
No  hand  outstretched  to  break  the  pallid  spell : 
And  then, — for  I  had  passed  that  way  before 
In  dreams,  my  fate  I  guessed;  but  not  till  You 
Stood  with  averted  face  and  did  not  speak, 
Perceived  the  shallow  horror  was  not  true ! 


66 


Y  little  Love  —  should  you  slip  from  my  side 
and  die, 
Your  soul  I  know  would  rise  to  bless  the  Summer 

night, 

A  timid  star, —  too  far  from  me!     Too  high! 
And  I,  through  unkissed  hours  should  scan  the  heav 
ens  bright 

Until  I  found  you  by  your  shivering  light, 
Aware  my  passion  even  from  your  sky. 
Remote  and  comfortless  that  far  gold  spirit  sign  — 
Dream  close,  lest  God  allure  you  from  these  arms  of 
mine! 


67 


IV 
CHANSONETTE  D'UN  REVE 

V\7AKEFUL  our  love-haunted  garden  sweet, 

(What  have  you  done  to  my  dreams,  Petite?) 
Wistful  the  breath  of  the  mignonette, 
(Dreams  that  remember  when  days  forget?) 

The  silence  grows  and  the  night  is  sweet, 

(What  have  you  breathed  through  my  dreams,  Petite?) 

The  amorous  moonlight  slumbers  deep, 

(O  the  wild  bird  calling  through  my  sleep!) 

The  dew  lies  glad  on  our  garden  sweet, 
(What  have  you  dared  in  my  dreams,  Petite?) 
The  moth  is  come  to  the  heliotrope, 
(So  might  a  kiss  through  the  darkness  grope!) 


68 


V 
OPIUM 

T  AM  that  one  in  whom  worn  hearts  forget 

Their  wasteful  wage  of  sin-earned  misery; 
Dear  Circe  of  the  sinful,  I  am  she 
Whose  face  with  tears  of  rueful  men  is  wet! 

My  voice  is  slow  with  murmur  of  the  sea, 

My  breast  like  green  seduction  of  her  graves 

I  bear  the  fevered  heart,  as  on  her  waves, 
Until  they  drown  beneath  all  memory. 

I  have  no  creed  of  life  or  loyalty, 
I  have  no  joy  of  daring,  or  disdain 

Of  perfidy ;  mine  are  the  weary  slain ; 
The  fallen,  as  to  love,  turn  back  to  me. 

In  my  betrayal  certain  madness  lies, 
Of  my  desertion  Emperors  have  died; 

My  soft  embrace  no  bliss  may  safe  deride, 
For  I  am  she  no  man  may  dare  despise. 

My  hair  is  stupor;  languor-shaded  deep 

My  eyes,  and  dark  with  unsearched  mystery ; 

Men  find  Nirvana's  prophecy  in  me, 
I  am  the  timeless  courtesan  of  Sleep ! 
69 


VI 

ROSEMARY 

A  DREAMING  of  past  lovers 
"^^  For  half  the  night  she  lay, 
Some  dead  since  many  Summers, 

Some  half  the  world  away. 
Grey  eyes  and  brown  once  fervent 

Sank  deep  into  her  own, 
For  tears  and  futile  longing 

So  dim  and  wistful  grown. 

Young  lips  smiled  old  caresses 

As  youth  came  back  again, 
Unto  their  lure  she  yielded  — 

Incredulous  and  fain ; 
Yet  none  did  chide  the  faithless 

For  lips  and  eyes  astray 
From  troth  so  weary  guarded 

Throughout  the  faithful  day. 

No  jealous  law  withheld  them, 

When  nearness  snatched  their  breath 
To  merge  their  listless  being 

In  waking  —  or  in  death ; 
But  one  faint  face  eluded, 

The  old  mad,  vanished  way  — 
And  weeping  for  remembrance 

For  half  the  night  she  lay !  ' 

70 


T 


VII 

ATTAINED! 
HIS  is  no  dream ! 


For   when   in    dreaming 
Love  counterfeits  the  raptured  sense, 
The  sacrament  of  Spirit  fails  me 
In  premonitions  of  suspense. 

This  is  no  dream ! 

Or  from  such  dreaming, 
The  sun  would  wake  me,  or  the  rain 
Upon  my  heart  —  as  tears  faint  falling  — 
Re-bind  the  daybreak's  silver  chain. 

This  is  no  dream! 

Nor  dream  of  dreaming, 
This  mystic  flight  of  soul  with  soul  — 
Starward,  yet  passionately  mortal, 
Unquenched  desire  our  flaming  goal! 


VIII 
A  FAREWELL 

'TpELL  one  bead  of  the  rosary  at  morn  for  me, 

And  go  your  way  — 
No  envy   shall   I   know  of  hearts  you   win,   regret, 

betray  — 

Remember  me,  white  Spirit,  when  you  pray, 
And  from  afar,  as  star  to  star  might  lean  — 
Disdained  the  brief  triumphant  heard  and  seen ! 
i 
In  sleep's  clairvoyant  reverie  dream  back  to  me, 

Across  the  night  — 
Let  your   voice   calling  from  the   inmost   realms   of 

Dream-land  bright  — 
Renew  elusive  echoes  of  delight! 
Pity  alone  were  mine,  if  granted  this, 
For  those  who  touch  your  hand  or  breathe  your  kiss. 


IX 

A  LOVER'S  SONG 

T  LIKE  a  May  night  best  to  lie  a' waking  — 

And  Summer  moons  to  dream  of  hasting  bliss, 
The  Autumn  darks  for  love's  supreme  surrender, 

Winter  for  sleep,  please  God,  forgetting  this ! 

Waking  or  sleeping,  loving,  aye  or  dreaming  — 
Life  speed  the  joy  that  doth  all  pain  beget! 

What  had  the  year  of  lure  or  hope  or  terror  — 
Robbed  of  the  kiss  whose  shadow  is  regret  ? 


X 

TO  SLEEP 
"  Perchance  to  dream." 

/^\    SLEEP,  come  not  as  you  have  come 

Through  all  the  feverish  years, 
Rouse  not  those  phantoms  of  desire 

That  waken  us  in  tears ! 
When    that   long   night   of   endless    dark  fit   us    for 

Paradise, 

Forbid  Life  play  her  drama  o'er  beneath  our  passive 
eyes! 

First  childhood,  dreaming  deep  of  toys 

The  daybreak  steals  away, 
The  Lover  hidden  with  his  bliss  — 

Turned  wistful  back  to  day; 

The  parted  Passionate  that  meet  to  almost  win  em 
brace, 
Before  the  waking  treachery  dissolves  in  pensive  grace. 

Then  sadder  dreams, —  where  those  long  lost 
Faint  through  our  slumbers  roam  — 

In  silent  marvel  at  our  joy 
In  seeing  them  turned  home; 

74 


TO  SLEEP 

So  real,  one  follows  after  sleep  their  presence  to  recall ; 
So  false,  that  all  day  long  their  shadows  cast  a  mystic 
pall. 

In  those  first  visions  of  the  night, 

Whose  dreams  were  augury 
To  Sibyl  and  to  Seer  of  old, 

What  strange  revealings  be! 
What  retributions  wait  us.  there!     Was  it  our  natal 

star 

That  cursed  our  rest  with  haggard  fears  and  limned 
us  as  we  are? 

O  Sleep,  come  not  as  you  have  come, 

With  dreams  so  mocking  sweet, 
Or  so  distraught  that  madness  lies 

The  way  your  paths  entreat  — 
To  ours  who  'neath  the  grasses  lie,  let  no  vain  visions 

creep, 
To  our  Beloved  may  it  be,  He  giveth  dreamless  sleep ! 


75 


HIDDEN 

"D  ENEATH  the  careless  jest  and  easy  laughter 

Sad  little  ghosts  of  passion  hide, 
Like  anguish  from  old  stifled  dreaming 
Nestling  in  silence  at  our  side. 

Mocking  and  pale  —  within  the  haunted  shadow 
Of  found  too  late  and  lost  too  soon  — 

Across  our  hearts  they  flit  impassive 
As  silver  seeking  of  the  moon. 

Always  they  kiss  —  their  fond  arms  laced  and  cling 
ing— 

The  while  we  chatter  far  removed, 
Dusk  little  wraiths  of  banished  sweetness 

Deriding  us  for  love  unloved. 


76 


A  CURSE 

f~\  UT  of  the  East  nor  West 

^•^      No  tender-eyed  shall  come 
To  love  thee  first  nor  best, 

Or  strike  old  echoes  dumb. 
Out  of  the  North  nor  South, 

Passion  nor  pain  nor  joy 
Shall  lay  to  thy  lips  the  waking  mouth 

That  made  thee  man  from  boy. 
Body  and  spirit  first-love  bereft, 

Whole  thou  shalt  never  be ; 
And  Heaven  itself  shall  take  what  I  left 

Branded  with  love  of  me ! 


77 


AFTER  GLOW 

t_T  ER  dawn  rose  opal  from  a  Summer  sea, 

Song  was  her  birthright  and  her  viol  strings 
Tuned  to  the  voices  of  all  raptured  things. 
Too  soon  Love  heard  her  singing  —  even  He 
Who  is  all  song,  all  joy,  all  agony, 
The  fire  of  Winters  and  the  sun  of  Springs, 
And  with  her  trod  the  early  blossomings 
A  little  hour, —  then  was  a  memory! 
Now  Day  goes  in  with  Pindar  to  the  feast 
Of  Gods,  and  happy  trains  pursue  delight; 
Across  brown  fields  She  turns  unto  the  East, 
Where  her  sun  rose,  not  where  he  lies  to-night, 
Nor  has  that  dew-lit  presence  ever  ceased 
To  blur  all  later  magic  on  her  sight. 


AFTERWARD 

THOU  most  remaining  of  retreating  things, 
I  die  of  beauty  felt  afar  from  thee ! 
Each  moon  become  a  ghost  of  dreams  to  me, 
Each  purple  shadow,  twilight  of  thy  wings. 
There  is  no  chord  the  husky  cello  sings 
But  sets  a  ravening  entreaty  free 
Once  more  to  mate  our  human  harmony, — 
Each  sense  a  prey  to  beauty-passionings. 

Bereft  of  thee,  Edens  are  stranger  grown 
Than  that  first  nightfall  on  the  exiled  Eve ; 
Thou  art  become  delight's  pale  enemy, 
Thou  lingering  elusive  undertone  — 
Desert  and  darkness  less  despairing  leave 
The  heart,  than  Beauty's  cup  unshared  by  thee ! 


79 


FROM  A  GHOST  TO  HER  LOVER 

C  HE  who  was  I  —  long  done  with  April  sobbing, 
Lies  with  her  face  turned  Eastward,  rapt  in  the 

slow  embrace 

Of  reminiscent  blisses,  embalmed  in  lilac  odours, 
While  passing  seasons  trace,  re-trace,  their  webs  of 
vanished  grace. 

What  drew  your  careless  footsteps  here  to  wake  her? 
She  was  so  passionless,  so  tranquil  dead  — 
Why  did  you  pipe  your  human  lilt  above  her, 
Sweeter  than  all  the  jealous  angels  said? 

Why  should  your  coming  rouse  her  passion's  music, 
Till  her  own  heart-beat  drowns  the  ebbing  stream 
Lulling  the  rhythm  of  her  lyric  slumber? 
Waking,  you  rob  her  of  the  endless  dream. 

What  hint  betrayed  a  troubled  pulse  within  her? 
How  did  you  feel  the  old  desire  but  slept? 
Drawing  her  by  your  echo  of  the  Springtide, 
Till  mortal  longing  through  her  senses  crept? 

Cruel,  O  Cruel !     Forcing  her  to  listen  — 
To  your  lost  voice  of  Pleasure's  light  recall, 
She  is  a  Ghost  —  I  swear  it !     Dead  and  buried  — 
She  dare  not  hear,  you  cannot  break  the  thrall. 

80 


FROM  A  GHOST  TO  HER  LOVER 

Go!     For  her  wistful  spirit  may  not  wander 
Forth  to  you  o'er  the  April  hills  again, 
Though  you  may  breathe  her  intimate  in  shadow  — 
Though  you  may  hear  her  in  the  fragrant  rain. 

She  who  was  I  —  long  done  with  blossomed  twilights, 
With  her  fixed  smile  vowed  rigid  unto  a  further  dawn, 
The  plighted  one  of  Gabriel  and  deep  of  death 

enamoured  — 
Shivering  hears  you  pass, —  re-pass, —  and  prays  you 

to  be  gone. 


81 


FOR  A  FLY-LEAF  OF  DANTE 
i 

PASSIONLESS  Dante!    Hades'  warning  pain 

Lost  power  when  you  left  pale  Francesca  there 
Within  her  lover's  arms.    What  wan  despair, 
What   exile   haunts   those  hearts   whom  Love  hath 

slain  — 

In  death  condemned  to  love  that  dreads  no  wane 
Since  he  is  Paolo  —  and  she  most  fair? 
Sensuous-souled  and  mystic-sensed  to  share 
Their  dream,  nor  deem  it  Paradise  in  vain ! 

The  sadder  shades  in  wistful  torment  gaze 
As  their  young  forms  curved  with  the  yielding  grace 
Of  flame  beneath  desire's  swift  breath  embrace  — 
While  each,  the  other's  wonder  doth  amaze. 
For  sake  of  arms  that  cling  and  souls  that  kiss 
Perdition  found  together  were  but  bliss ! 


THE  INTERPRETER 

ALAS !  the  Poet  sings  of  love  in  vain 
To  those  who  nothing  of  love's  torment  know ; 
Who  cannot  listen  sighing  "  Even  so 
I  burned  for  Philomel  " — "  Thus  was  I  fain 
To  grant  the  pleasure  of  my  shepherd  swain," 
"  His  eyes  were  thus," — "  Her  mouth  was  sweet  and 

slow/ 
Each  heart  rekindled  to  a  former  glow 
That  through  reflected  passion  flames  again. 
But  Love,  how  came  Rossetti  to  rehearse 
Diviner  intimacies  all  our  own? 
These  tears  he  weeps  are  tears  long  shed  for  you, 
The  languor  ours  his  shadow  lines  intone, 
And  our  despair  that  makes  the  heart  beat  through 
Each  word, —  till  ours  not  his  the  haunting  verse! 


L'ENVOI 

T   WEAR  no  rue  for  the  days  that  were, 

Days  of  delusion  as  keen  as  pain  — 
Full  of  folly  and  passion  and  song, 
Theirs  was  not  rapture  spent  in  vain. 

What  should  I  dream  in  the  days  that  are, 
Days  of  awaking  to  lonely  truth  — 

If  the  days  that  were  had  never  been, 
Steeped  in  their  yellow  wine  of  youth  ? 

What  were  the  vows  that  we  left  unsworn, 
In  our  Fool's  paradise,  Love  and  I? 

What  random  sweet  under  moon  or  sun 
Did  our  lips  hesitate  to  try? 

Twixt  the  joy  of  then  and  the  calm  of  now, 
Strange  seas  of  fathomless  being  flow, — 

I  wear  no  rue  for  the  days  that  were, 
In  the  leisurely  afterglow ! 


TO  A  GHOST 

CJOUL  of  passion,  mirth  and  tears, 

Spirit  of  the  vanished  Spring, 
In  your  marble  stateliness 
Do  you  hear  me  as  I  sing? 

Does  rny  heart-beat  reach  your  dream? 

Do  the  lilacs  tinge  for  you? 
Are  they  vanity  at  last, 

All  the  sweet  things  that  we  knew  ? 

Kisses  on  your  lips  of  dust, 

Even  mine, —  would  naught  avail, 

Since  between  us,  Loved  and  Lost, 
Death  has  dropped  the  arras  pale. 

If  I  left  the  world  to-night, 
What  my  welcome  out  in  space? 

Should  I  find  you,  know  you  there 
By  the  tears  upon  your  face  ? 

Ghost  of  Summers  vanished  long, 
Folded  hands  no  more  caress  — 

Should  we  make  of  sorrow,  song? 
Poesy  of  weariness  ? 

85 


TO  A  GHOST 

Do  you  hear  me  while  I  call  ? 

Drink  with  me  the  spirit  wine? 
Once  you  swore  your  soul  the  slave 

Of  this  flaming  soul  of  mine ! 

What  your  fond  vocation  now  ? 

Wraiths  of  women  wan  and  fair, 
Do  they  waft  you, —  earth  forgot  — 

Though  eternal  wastes  of  air? 

Did  your  vows  and  longing  cease? 

Is  your  spirit  bond  or  free? 
Crueller  than  Death  this  peace  — 

Creeping  betwixt  you  and  me ! 


86 


THE  LOVER'S  ANSWER 

'T1  HE  Poets  whisper  "  Love  is  swift  to  ashes  " — 

"  The   roses   fall  —  our    hearts   to  time   must 

bow  "— 

We  kissed,  and  mocked  them,  as  our  passion  deepened, 
Must  we  accept  their  pallid  verdict  now? 

Was  it  for  us  to  follow  lone  and  sighing 
Where  husky  voices  from  their  graves  deride? 

Accept  the  burden  sore  of  lover's  yearning  — 
Dolours  and  tears  and  wasteful  dreams,  untried? 

Nay,  if  we  knew  of  their  lost  Springs  one  dawning, 
If  Love  one  little  moon  has  turned  her  face 

Un-veiled, —  ours  be  their  sentence  sad  and  final, 
But  ours  their  legacy  of  golden  grace! 

For  us  the  flower !     We  caught  the  raptured  cadence ! 

We  twined  with  Love  the  garland  way  of  youth ! 
Ours  to  interpret  by  that  lyric  moment 

The  beauty  and  the  pity  of  their  truth ! 


ALLEGRO  CON  GRAZIA 
(THE  SYMPHONY  PATHETIQUE  OF  TSCHAIKOWSKY) 

AT  the  silvering  rim  of  darkest  dawn 
Still  my  wistful  Lover  lingering  sate, 
Moon  and  stars  and  rapture  gone  — 
By  my  grave  dispassionate ; 

Sifting  through  his  fingers  warm 
Ashes  of  my  heart  and  hair, 
Ghosts  of  sense  set  free  at  last 
Wantoning  upon  the  air. 

(Pause) 

Envious  Morpheus  binds  no  jealous  dream 
Closer  than  those  amorous  mortal  hands. 

—  Can  it  be  remembered  tears 
Cloud  the  seraph  sarabands  ?  — 

Lips  that  kissed  but  yester-year 
Muted  now  in  smiling  frost, 
Sighing  through  the  cypress  trees 
For  the  taste  of  pleasure  lost. 

(Sound  of  dry  leaves  falling) 

Ye,  who  shimmering  flaunt  in  life's  bright  zone  • — 
Beds  inviolate  now  await  your  mirth, 

Ye  shall  wed  as  I  am  wed 
With  the  sullen  arms  of  earth ; 
And  your  Lovers  vainly  seek 
88 


ALLEGRO  CON  GRAZIA 

In  some  fickle  paraphrase, 

Groping  futile  to  forget, 

Haunted  by  a  vague  malaise. 

(Sound  of  wind  in  bare  branches} 
Death  —  the  unfaltering  sower  casts  his  seed, 

Time  —  the  unhindered  turns  his  dripping  glass, 

And  the  sands  that  run  between 
Hearts  of  women  'neath  the  grass. 

Unto  them  be  Paradise! 

Unto  me,  my  Lover  there  — 

Sifting  through  his  empty  hands 

Ashes  of  my  heart  and  hair ! 


89 


THE  OLD  MUSICIAN 

1LTE  dreams  of  youth, 

He  dreams  of  love, 
And  while  his  fingers  touch  the  strings, 

The  fitful  sighs  of  passions  past 
Flit  o'er  his  soul  on  gusty  wings. 

A  random  sob, 

A  sudden  tear  — 
May  find  their  echo  in  his  chord, 

Yet  while  he  plays  —  the  world  is  young! 
You  scant  his  joy  who  swift  applaud. 

Ah,  wake  him  not ! 

The  world  is  old  — 
The  world  is  cruel, —  while  he  plays 

Happy  he  is  and  well  beloved  — 
The  gallant  of  his  golden  days ! 


90 


THE  LAST  ECHO 

VX/"HAT  cadence  of  the  world's  delight  will  linger 
on, 

When  all  my  errant  wanderings  be  dust  and  done? 
Haply  the  benediction  soft  intoned  at  Rome, 
Losing  its  way  in  cloudy  incense  'neath  the  dome ; 
Or  when  from  slender  towers  escape  the  cloistered 

sighs 
Of  vesper  bells  to  ring  down  oleander  skies; 

Or  thud  of  running  Cossack  horse  on  morning  grass, 
Chilling  the  startled  blood  beyond  the  bugler's  brass. 

Perchance    the    nightingales    of    Greece    as    passion 

swayed 
They  sang  the  deathless  sting  of  love  from  out  the 

shade ; 

Or  baleful  cuckoo's  troubling  voice,  forboding  ill 
When  shadows  crossed  the  sun  at  noon,  from  glade 

to  hill 

Of  those  enchanted  deeps  of  leafy  Fontainebleau, 
Where  romance  lends  a  nest  to  wandering  dreams, — 

ah,  no ! 

Nor  doth  the  sea  repeat  it  as  her  flood  subsides, 
Drawn  from  her  moon  ward  longing  by  her  jealous 

tides. 


THE  LAST  ECHO 

Nay,  none  of  these  within  my  soul  will  linger  on 
When  the  last  ravishment  of  sense  be  dull  and  done ! 

Rather  a  human  love  word,  fainting  on  its  start 

Across  the  distance  from  thy  lips  unto  my  heart; 
Nor  yet  the  wistful  word  that  swooned  upon  the 
wing, 

But  echo  of  our  raptured  silence  following. 


92 


TO  THE  CELLO 

THOU    who    hast    sought    as    we  —  and    never 
found  — 

And  seeking  still  doth  haunt  the  Shades  of  sound, 
We  hear  thy  footfall  thread  the  darks  of  pain, 
Through  crypts  of  Being  wander  forth  again. 
The  sea  reverberates  within  thy  chorded  strings, 
Her    swimming   ectasies    and    fair   dead    drowned 

things ; 
The  wind  doth  sigh  with  thee  from  off  far  Pisgah 

heights, 
Fraught    with    the    trembling    mystery    of    forest 

nights, 
Ranging  through  starry  passions  unassuaged  and  wise. 

The  Poet's  soul  thou  art, —  his  hell  and  paradise. 
Throughout  our  buried  life  a  wanderer  divine, 
Bliss  cannot  bar  thee  out  or  agony  confine ; 
Thine  adorations  lift  a  daring  breath 
Across  the  barricades  of  love  and  death ; 
Thou  art  to  us  what  thou  canst  never  know  — 
The  lifted  veil  of  beauty  here  below. 


93 


TO  A  STREET  ORGAN  MELODY 

T?  LUNG  out  upon  the  air  through  mists  of  snow, 
•*•        Straight  to  the  heart  it  rises  from  below, 
That  song  so  late  Love's  own! 

A  year  ago 

The  world  went  mad  beneath  its  subtle  sweet ; 
Nothing  so  sad  save  one  girl's  face  I  know  — 

Wherein  remembered  beauty  lingers,  though 
No  longer  queen  of  courtly  revels  now, 

Grown  sordid,  half-desired,  she  as  thou 
Has  wandered  from  Love's  halls  upon  the  street ! 


94 


UNTO  THE  GOD  OF  PLEASURE 


all  the  Roman  revelries  forgot 
Of  mad  Caligula,  who  did  his  world  out-dare, 
Enamoured  to  the  lips  of  favourites  and  hot 

With  lusty  wine  and  tyranny,  compare 
With  him  my  lute  would  sing,  —  the  God  of  Pleasure. 
Sing  my  lute  !     Wake  to  some  frenzied  measure  ! 
Feasters  jaded, 
Roses  faded, 

Crystal  philtres  —  what  comes  after 
Fillets  twined  with  love  and  laughter? 

Diana's  temples  on  the  far  ^Egean, 

Nor  Dionysus'  bacchanals  in  green  array  — 

Have  raised  their  Gods  a  more  delirious  paean, 
Than  we  who  reel  at  Pleasure's  call  to-day. 

Hail  the  immortal  tyrant,  mortal  Pleasure! 
Sing  my  lute  !     Ring  out  a  pagan  measure  ! 

Passioned  glances, 
Siren  dances, 

Harp  and  viol  —  what  comes  after 
Kisses  wet  with  love  and  laughter  ? 

Cruel  the  despot  is,  —  though  outwardly 

His  sceptre  marks  the  beat  of  every  man's  de 
sire  — 

95 


UNTO  THE  GOD  OF  PLEASURE 

His  empire  to  the  grave  discerns  no  boundary, 

His  smile  is  bright  as  purgatory  fire. 
Sing  my  lute  the  chariot  wheels  of  Pleasure ! 
Sing  my  lute !     Ring  out  a  brazen  measure ! 
Neighing  courser, 
Bravos  hoarser, 

Red  arenas  —  what  comes  after 
Gilded  death  and  love  and  laughter  ? 

Loved  as  no  monarch  e'er  was  loved, —  in  vain ! 

From  crown  to  lowly  cot  his  'tribute  he  pursues, 
From  every  careless  heart  that  follows  in  his  train 

He  wrings  the  payment  of  his  poisoned  dues. 
Wail  my  lute!     Deplore  in  doleful  measure 

The  ravages  of  our  mad  tyrant  Pleasure! 
Wail  the  crushed  grape  and  fevered  brow  — 

Wail  the  spent  will  and  broken  vow  — 
Wail  the  swift  youth  of  squandered  treasure 

Bowed  in  the  vassalage  of  passing  Pleasure ! 


96 


A  CLUB-MAN'S  REQUIEM 

" ARREN  has  gone ;  and  we  who  loved  him  best 
Can't  think  of  him  as 

"  entered  into  rest." 

But  he  has  gone ;  has  left  the  morning  street, 
The  clubs  no  longer  echo  to  his  feet, 
Nor  shall  we  see  him  lift  his  yellow  wine 
To  pledge  the  random  host  —  the  purple  vine. 

At  doors  of  other  men  his  horses  wait, 
His  whining  dogs  scent  false  their  master's  fate; 
His  chafing  yacht  at  harbour  mooring  lies; 
"  Owner  ashore  "  her  idle  pennant  flies. 
Warren  has  gone  — 

Forsook  the  jovial  ways 

Of  Winter  nights  —  turned  from  his  well-loved  plays, 
The  dreams  and  schemes  and  deeds  of  busy  brain, 
And  pensive  habitations  built  in  Spain. 
Gone,  with  his  ruddy  hopes !     And  we  who  knew  him 

best 
Can't  think  of  him  as  "  entered  into  rest." 

So  when  the  talk  dies  out  or  lights  burn  dim 
We  often  ponder  what  is  keeping  him  — 
What  destiny  that  all-subduing  will, 
That  golden  wit,  that  love  of  life,  fulfil  ? 
For  we  who  silent  smoke,  who  loved  him  best, 
Can't  fancy  Warren  "  entered  into  rest." 

97 


DECORATION  DAY 

"C^LAGS  and  the  band  and  marching  — 

Of  faithful  veteran  feet, 
Fathers,  young  men,  and  children 

With  voices  shrill  and  sweet ; 
And  Lincoln's  spirit  marching  in  every  shining  line, 
And  Lincoln's  peace  and  freedom  lit  with  the  smile 

Divine ! 
Flags  and  the  band  and  marching  — 

Banners  that  proudly  wave, 
May,  green  upon  the  meadows 
And  on  the  soldier's  grave; 

The  boys  in  blue  are  ashes  'neath  the  lilacs  on  their  sod, 
But  their  souls  are  free  forever  with  Lincoln  and  with 

God! 

Flags  and  the  band  and  marching  — 
And  the  drum-beat's  steady  throb. 
Pipe  on  above,  O  Robin, 

To  drown  a  sudden  sob ! 
The  laurel  wreath  for  heroes  dead !     And  a  cheer  for 

all  the  brave 

Who  march  with  Lincoln's  soul  to-day  to  liberate  and 
savel 


WHERE  GOD  IS 

only  in  the  meetinghouse 
That  tops  a  windy  hill, 
Where  droning  psalm  and  discourse  long 

Warn  of  His  awful  will; 
Nor  in  the  hushed  cathedral  gloom 

Replete  with  mystic  sign, 
'Mid  kneeling  worshippers  devout, 
We  hear  the  heart  divine. 

But  when  the  twilight  sets  a  star 

On  heaven's  amber  rim, 
When  oceans  rave  or  tempests  roar 

Their  first  creation's  hymn ; 
In  some  undreamed-of  providence, 

Or  mortal  contact  dear, 
In  some  lone  last  extremity  — 

We  find  his  presence  near ! 


99 


IN  A  HILLSIDE  GRAVEYARD 

ACROSS  their  graves  impartial  shines  the  sun, 
In  that  community  of  buried  life 
Where  each,  when  he  his  best  had  done,  laid  down 
His  passing  triumph,  weariness  and  strife. 

Neighbours  they  lived,  who  still  as  neighbours  sleep, 
And  oft  opposed  for  church  and  state  they  strove 

While  each  some  measure  won  of  that  which  man, 
In  his  brief  vision,  calls  renown  and  love. 

Across  their  graves  impassive  smiles  the  moon, 
Whose  paler  light  harmonious  balms  their  fame 

And  writes  strange  shadow  legends  on  their  stones, 
To  cheer  the  waning  portent  of  a  name. 

The  ends  to  which  each  gave  his  years,  survive ; 

A  few  remembering  hearts  remember  yet  — 
Beyond  this  common  mortal  elegy 

Nature  must  justify,  when  men  forget. 

Across  their  graves  impartial  shines  the  sun, 
The  moonbeam  lies  on  snowdrift  as  on  sward ; 

May  God's  eye  pierce  this  lowly  neutral  sod 
And  souls  like  theirs  distinguish  and  reward ! 


100 


THE  CRYPT 

T>ENEATH  the  edifice  that  men  call  Me  — 
•*-^    Whose  minarets  attract  the  setting  sun, 
Whose  portals  to  the  passer-by  are  free, 
Abides  another  one. 

The  heartbeat  of  the  organ  throbs  not  there, 
To  jar  the  heavy  silence  of  the  soul ; 

Nor  low  amen  of  alcolytes  at  prayer, 
Nor  bells  that  ring,  or  toll. 

Unsought,  undreamed  save  by  a  solemn  few, 
Who  with  a  lantern  lit  of  love  descend  — 

To  find  the  buried  arches  grim  and  true, 
On  which  the  walls  depend! 


101 


THE  MIDSUMMER  OF  A  NUN 

I  —  July  2Oth —  The  Virgin's  Eve 
II  —  July  22nd  —  St.  Mary  Magdalen 

III  —  July  23rd  —  St.  Liborio  the  Bishop 

IV  —  July  24th  —  St.  Christine  the  Virgin 
V  —  July  25th  —  St.  James  the  Apostle 

VI  — July  28th  — The  Feast  of  the  Martyrs 
VII 


1 02 


I 

THE  VIRGIN'S  EVE 

AT  Vespers  yesterday,  I  swore  to  say 
A  rosary  each  time  my  heart  forgot 
Its  vows  and  thought  love's  wayward  thought  again. 
The  stained  glass  Saints  in  vivid  choirs  looked  down, 
Bathed  me  in  fixed  and  abnegating  smiles; 
Saint  Stephen  in  his  myrtle  robes  approved 
That  love  was  guile,  each  time  my  eyes  obeyed 
The  inviting  arms  of  that  great  crucifix 
That  hangs  between  his  window,  and  the  one 
Of  fair  young  Abel  stripped  for  sacrifice. 
As  bird  escaped  the  snare  of  worldly  ill, 
My  soul  unfettered  soared  on  holy  wing, 
In  rapt  communion  with  the  Purified. 
Alas  !     The  Priest's  last  intonation  fell  — 
And  just  from  habit,  still  upon  my  knees, 
I  sinned'. 

I  prayed,  not  as  a  Sister  prays 
For  sinners  lost  outside  the  cloister  peace  — 
But  that  old  scarlet  prayer  of  joy  for  him! 


103 


II 

SAINT  MARY  MAGDALEN 

V\7HAT  penance  is  there  done  for  love's  dear  sake, 

So  sore  as  putting  love  away,  with  lone 
Committals  of  f orgetf ulness  ?     I  said 
"  Hail  Mary !  "  o'er  a  hundred  times  last  night, 
Found  consolation  in  Our  Lady's  name ; 
Her  seven  sorrows  entering  into  mine 
Drove  the  forbidden  thought  from  out  my  cell. 
I  watched  it  furtive  through  the  grating  slim 
Waft  upward  to  the  far  oblivious  moon ; 
Wondering  if  Saint  or  God  shone  in  that  vague 
Benignant  face  I  worshipped  as  a  child. 
If  God  is  love,  how  strange  he  should  condemn 
Our  love  as  mortal  sin !     He  might  create 
Us  as  the  Virgin  lilies  chaste  and  pale, 
Performing  rites  of  light  and  holiness 
And  fragrant  incense  white, —  yet  we  are  formed 
To  yearn  for  human  touch,  prayer  of  the  sense, 
A  liturgy  whose  "  amen  "  is  a  kiss  — 
Be  deaf  O  Heaven !  Forgive ! 

Sad  women  Saints, 
Of  ye  alone  henceforth  I  supplicate, 
Till  washed  and  blotted  out  this  secret  fault. 
By  all  your  passions  past,  your  martyrdoms, 
Grant  me  to  hate  as  God  would  have  me  hate ! 
Nor  spare  the  last  bright  vestige  of  a  dream ! 

104 


Ill 

SAINT  LIBORIO  THE  BISHOP 

ID  ET WEEN  the  holy  offices  all  day 

I  never  left  the  altar,  where  before 
That  crucifix  by  some  dead  master-hand, 
In  silent  hope  of  mute  deliverance 
I  knelt.     On  shadow  avocations  wont 
The  black-robed  Sisters  often  went  and  came  — 
I  dared  not  leave  the  shelter  blindly  sought 
Beneath  the  greater  agony  of  One 
Who  loved  and  suffered,  just  to  spare  the  Lost 
Their  dread  eternities.     Before  His  wounds 
Of  thorn  and  spear  my  woman's  hurt  allayed; 
Though  His  wide  love  for  all  a  sinning  world 
Is  not  the  same  as  one  sharp  dagger  cut 
That  knows  its  way  familiar  to  the  heart, — 
The  love  one  woman  suffers  for  one  man 
A  little  better  or  a  little  worse 
Than  all  the  rest, —  as  may  be,  which  to  her 
Is  nothing,  as  the  world's  ingratitude 
Was  nothing  to  its  Victim  slain  to  save. 
O  face  upon  the  cross,  you  could  forgive ! 
And  he  I  loved  could  not.     You  talked  serene 
With  that  light  woman  by  the  wayside  well, 
You  sent  unscathed  the  idle  Magdalen  — 

105 


SAINT  LIBORIO  THE  BISHOP 

Yet  such  divine  compassion  leaves  me  cold; 
The  soul's  high  Bridegroom  offering  in  vain 
Ethereal  espousals  to  efface 
Indulgence  from  my  passion-clouded  heart. 

Again  my  vow  foresworn?     Perdition's  thought 
Would  violate  the  sanctuary's  peace? 

0  tortured  face  above,  no  added  frown 
Upon  that  bleeding  brow  for  such  a  nun? 
Those  pinioned  arms  spurn  not  the  haunted  faith 
Of  her  who  seeks  some  compromise  twixt  love 
And  heaven?    The  gaze  is  still  of  pity?    Then, 
Let  me  be  wicked,  lost,  but  hear  the  truth  — 

1  love  him  best ! 

Now  smite  me  to  the  dust. 


106 


AT  matins  in  humility  abased, 
As  turned  to  stone  by  knees  insensate  pressed, 
Before  the  empty  hospice  of  my  heart 
The  long  years  seemed  as  endless  highways  stretched ; 
Whereon  as  pious  pilgrim  faring  forth, 
At  each  poor  wayside  Calvary  I  paused, 
In  sacred  fancy  sought  their  shriving  blest, 
From  all  consuming,  unangelic  loves. 
Till  Satan,  envious  of  sweet  innocence, 
With  his  insidious  subtleties  drew  near  — 
And  moved  the  sad  Madonna  in  her  niche 
Above,  to  utter  weary  blasphemies. 
As  one  distraught  I  heard  her  prayer  — 
"  Pity  me,  God !  the  woman  lonely  within  the  shrine ! 
Sick  with  the  lavished   incense,  worshipped  as  one 

divine ; 

Canonised,  blest,  forgotten  —  on  prayer  eternal  fed, 
Sated  with  supplication,  starving  for  daily  bread! 
These  hands  nor  clasp,  nor  conquer,  uplifted  to  my 

throne ; 

Nor  lips  of  little  children  shall  ever  warm  my  own. 
Pity  me,  God!  the  woman,  Mother  of  Sorrows  and 

pain! 

Loose  me  from  adorations,  make  me  a  woman  again !  " 

107 


Oh,  white-coifed  Sisters,  was  your  calm  so  bought? 

Beneath  your  folded  hands  are  craters  hid? 

Oh,  Convent  Mother,  scourge  me,  let  me  serve 

The  lowest !     Be  the  least !     So  I  dispel 

The  curse  of  pliant  Eve  upon  me  laid, 

The  eternal  woman,  quick  at  thought  of  him ! 


108 


SAINT  JAMES  THE  APOSTLE 

AT  Benediction  suddenly  they  came 
And  bade  me  take  my  place  within  the  choir, 
Sister  Beata  being  stricken  hoarse, 
And  my  voice  of  all  others  most  like  hers. 
I  had  not  sung  since  —  sole  my  Lover  knows 
What  place,  what  hour. 

Ah  well,  I  had  no  choice. 
Obedience  is  the  heart-beat  of  a  nun. 
But  when  the  organ's  brave  Magnificat 
Accosted  space, —  swept  up  on  wings  of  glory 
I  heard  my  own  voice  music  to  the  stars  — 
Angels  or  demons  caught  me,  as  I  swung 
Above  high  heaven,  above  these  human  bonds 
That  wound  me  for  Christ's  sake.     My  psalteries 
Inflamed,  lit  torches  that  set  all  the  dome 
With  love's  immortal  pageantries  ablaze. 

The  consecrated  canticles  I  sang, 
Yet  vibrant  with  the  love  a  woman  spills 
As  sacred  ointment  o'er  the  feet  she  laves; 
Faithful  though  men  deceive,  changeless  in  change, 
Through  words  that  phrased  divine  fidelity 

109 


SAINT  JAMES  THE  APOSTLE 

Unto  a  world  where  all  beside  must  fade, 
With  shameless  rapture  of  the  Seraphim, 
I  sang  the  love  that  never  was, —  sang  out 
The  love  of  which  we  evermore  must  dream 
And  wake  dissatisfied. 

The  measure  broke  — 
To  fevered  lips  o'erflowing  cups  I  held; 
The  youth  in  us  that  will  not  die,  I  hymned, 
The  purple  passions  and  the  simple  sweets, 
The  dawns  no  day  can  follow  or  fulfil, 
A  languid  face  faint  'neath  love's  ministries  — 
Eternal  fragrance  and  eternal  pain, 
Eternal  April  and  eternal  love, 
Seen  through  symbolic  rainbows  of  glad  tears ! 
Then  whispers, —  moving  us  to  wonderment 
If  past  the  power  of  sense  or  self  exists 
A  good  no  passion  and  no  love  conceive? 
Till  voices  faltered  —  grew  hysterical  — 
The  candles  flickered  —  dropped  into  the  dark  - 

Thus  was  I  silenced  by  supreme  decree, 
Bade  evermore  beneath  a  raven  robe 
To  strangle  that  untoward  nightingale 
Transfiguring  their  dun  beatitude 
To  vivid  accents  of  apostasy. 
Kyrie  Eleison !     God's  will  be  done ! 


no 


VI 

THE  FEAST  OF  THE  MARTYRS 

/""^  ONFESSED,  admonished,  absolution  given, 
The  exacted  penance  to  the  utmost  done  — 
Nay  more, —  indulgence  won  in  grim  excess ; 
Ravished  by  self-inflicted  punishment  — 
Fasting  and  praying  till  by  force  they  strove 
To  gently  draw  me  from  my  orisons  — 
My  spirit  broken,  spent  but  pacified 
Partook  the  celebration  of  the  Mass. 
The  festal  hues  of  vestments  blent  confused; 
A  myriad  of  sacred  candles  streamed 
O'er  undulating  ministrants  who  served 
Devout,  the  radiant  altar's  mystic  feast. 
The  cadence  rose  and  fell ;  mute  acolytes, 
Symbolic  genuflection,  postured  prayer 
Proceeded  rhythmic  each  from  each,  then  hush- 
Discordant  jangling  of  a  startled  bell 
Proclaiming  elevation  of  the  Host. 

Beneath  my  downcast  eyes  a  light  mist  swayed ; 
Within,  gold-haloed  faint  the  bitter  cup! 
Renunciation's  cup  that  may  not  pass 
Undrained  —  a  blue  flame  circling  at  the  brim, 
Extended  by  unseen,  supernal  hands. 
And  for  the  first  time,  nun  at  heart,  I  wept. 

in 


VII 


"DUT  afterward!     What  dreams  unsanctified 

Suffused  that  vision  of  Gethsemane! 
How  may  a  soul  o'er  Powers  of  Dark  prevail, 
If  after  strict  observance  of  the  Rule, 
Night  opens  paradise  renewed  in  sin? 
Wide-ranging  passion  and  the  steady  vow 
Alike  betrayed  to  venial  carnivals, 
By  Foe  in  flame  'neath  iris-hued  disguise ! 

No  Vestal  I,  save  that  my  spirit  fires 
Incessant  burn, —  not  unto  heaven,  but  those 
Forsaken  altars  of  the  starving  sense, 
Where  beauty's  various  wonderments  entreat. 
No  "  Pax  Vobiscum  "  shields  unconsciousness, 
In  vain  the  "  Tantum  Ergo  "  warns  between 
Our  phantom  adorations  each  of  each, 
The  "  In  Excelsis !  "  echoing  supreme 
To  Love's  mad  miracle  that  turns  to  wine 
Fit  for  a  marriage  feast,  the  mournful  tides 
Of  cloister  sleep.     I  was  not  cloister-born, 
Nor  Bride  of  Heaven  to  keep  celestial  watch 
Beneath  Midsummer's  sjlver-vigiled  stars, — 
And,  rid  the  fear  of  Purgatory's  wage, 

112 


I  trod  the  golden  meadows  of  the  Gods, 
The  nun's  diurnal  Virginals  transformed 
To  lawless  bacchanals  of  dream. 

The  bells 

Recalled  me  to  my  pallet  bed,  at  dawn, 
My  arms  outstretched  in  semblance  of  a  cross 
In  my  left  hand  the  rosary  close  clasped. 


A  TALE  OF  TUSCANY 

pRAISE  to  the  eternal  Maker  of  all  men! 

Praise  Holy  Mary  and  the  Trinity  1 
Praise  our  Lorenzo  the  Magnificent, 
And  praise  to  ye,  gay  masking  Florentines, 
Ye  youths  and  maidens  who  make  revel  here, 
To  hail  the  Spring's  return  o'er  Tuscany ! 

Attend  unto  my  tale  —  'tis  simply  sung, 
The  plaintive  folly  of  a  youthful  monk, 
Too  soft  of  heart  and  young  of  sense,  become 
Enamoured  of  the  listless  Lady  Moon. 
With  litanies  long  strove  he  to  distract 
This  mystic  passion  from  his  soul  away  — 
But  how  his  torment  fell,  it  is  my  tale 

Pacing  one  eve,  in  pious  fervour  wrapt, 
His  eyes  above  his  breviary  strayed  — 
And  he  in  consequence  did  soft  perceive 
Fair  Mona  Luna  bathing  in  the  stream ; 
The  Arno's  murmuring  courses  glorified 
Thereby.     He  was  a  youthful  monk,  unproved 
By  such  device  as  tried  Saint  Anthony, 
Nor  guessed  to  lend  unto  a  bathing  nymph 
His  vision  vowed  to  God,  was  deadly  sin. 
And  as  he  watched,  his  passion  mastered  him,- 
Trembling  as  tiny  ripples  on  the  shore  — 

114 


A  TALE  OF  TUSCANY 

But  deepening  as  the  silences  mid-stream, 
Till  when  far  out  she  seemed  to  slip  beneath 
The  shallow  surfaces,  her  soul  asleep  — 
In  agony  of  fear  lest  she  should  drown, 
His  saffron  frock  he  doffed  to  follow  her, 
Just  as  an  aged  Father,  late  turned  home 
From  some  last  office  read  a  dying  saint 
No  doubt, —  laid  warning  hands  on  him. 

Ah,  he 

A  youthful  brother, —  guessing  not  his  sin, 
And  penitent, —  may  our  Lord  pardon  such! 
Yet  who  shall  say  if  his  knees  served  aright 
Indulgence  for  his  craving  eyes  to  win? 
For  oh,  the  Donna  Luna  was  unsworn 
To  chastity,  obedience  or  pain ! 
No  mortal  vow  kept  she,  but  fair  and  white 
And  amorous  at  heart,  perhaps  she  cried 
"  Alas  Madonna  mia !     Exiles  we  — 
Will  no  man  wed  with  thee  or  me  ?    Alas ! 
For  us  twain  supernatural,  removed 
From  mortal  mating ;  loveless  and  unloved !  " 
I  say  perhaps  she  cried, —  for  none  may  dream 
The  secret  faith  of  woman,  sinner,  saint 
Or  moon. 

But  he  —  through  nights  of  rain  he  prayed  — 
And  rose  a  proven  monk.     With  orison 
And  rosary  he  wore  his  days  away ; 
Vespers  and  aves  shrove  him,  till  at  last 
One  Summer  midnight  from  the  chapel  dim 
Unto  his  narrow  cell  he  passed, —  to  find 


A  TALE  OF  TUSCANY 

Her  lying  on  his  pallet  bed  —  her  smile 
The  calm  white  smile  of  passion  after  death; 
So  silvery  and  soft  she  came  to  him ! 
Ah,  Mona  Luna  knew  it  was  a  sin  — 
The  open  casement  lured, —  she  entered  there 
And  with  her  came  the  breath  of  Summer  night, 
Firenze's  flower-scented  bride.     Tube-rose 
And  jasmine  perfume  swift  o'erturned  his  sense, 
He  swooned  upon  his  wayward  Mistress'  breast  — 
A  gentle  victim  of  her  ghostly  wile. 
Then  came  a  life  of  madness ;  day  'gainst  night. 
"  Too  sore  he  fasts !  "  the  holy  brothers  cried ; 
"  Too  long  his  vigils !     Now  o'er  ripe  for  heaven 
The  fires  celestial  hover  round  his  head ! " 
Paler  he  grew;  within  his  eyes  there  seemed 
To  strive  a  light  of  hell  and  paradise. 
Hectic  his  flush  —  his  rosary  heavier  through 
His  trembling  fingers  daily  slipped  its  weight  — 
And  every  bead  petition  was  for  night ! 
Midsummer  passed, — 'twas  on  Saint  Martin's  eve 
The  end  befell;  as  usual  he  crept 
From  shadow  of  the  altar  to  his  cell, 
His  Mistress  waiting  with  her  phantom  guile 
To  take  his  shaven  head  upon  her  breast; 
But  stay  —  a  golden  jewelled  chalice  out 
The  sacristy  he  bore,  and  with  it  knelt; 
While  on  the  ruby's  blood  and  opal  fire 
She  laid  her  kisses,  till  they  overflowed 
With  beaming  ecstasies  the  sacred  cup. 
"  So  will  I  drink  thee,  Sorceress ! "  he  swore, 

116 


A  TALE  OF  TUSCANY 

"  Drink  all  thy  smile  and  my  distraught  desire ! " 
And  wildly  drank  he  —  then  with  closed  eyes 
Insensate  fell  upon  the  flagging  cold. 

They  found  him  so  when  matins  failed  his  due; 
Dead,  unconfessed,  unshriven  and  unblessed, 
A  heart  of  Tuscany  beneath  his  frock. 
Now  of  his  legend  there  remains  unsung 
Only  that  on  the  tombstone  of  a  monk, 
Within  a  cloister  yard  Dominican, 
The  moon  doth  constant  lay  her  pale  embrace  — 
Doth  love  to  dwell  upon  the  name  of  one 
Long  canonised  a  visioned  Saint. 

To  him, 

A  youthful  brother,  guessing  not  his  sin, 
And  penitent,  may  our  Lord  pardon  much ! 


117 


TWILIGHT  AT  FLORENCE 

AGAIN  the  fiery  fingers  of  the  scarlet  creepers 
write 
Their    brief    Autumnal    message    on    the    wall    of 

Eremite, 

Of  villa  and  of  vintage,  and  again  the  orchard  sees 
A  low  white  moon  entangled  in  her  mesh  of  olive 

trees. 
Down  the  slopes  of  Bellosguardo  the  grape  leaves  hold 

the  sun, 
While  through  the  inner  cloisters  wan  the  purple 

shadows  run; 
And    wide-horned    oxen,    homeward    turned,    stride 

rhythmic,  cheek  to  cheek, 

Fit  for  the  sacrificial  pyre  of  beauty-loving  Greek. 
Somewhere  a  sudden  bursting  of  pomegranate 

hearted  song 

Such  as  to  sultry  lover  throats  of  Italy  belong ! 
E'er  over  dome  and  palace  night  wraps  her  silken 

husk, 
Fiesole's  enchanted  lights  come  twinkling  up  the 

dusk; 

The  Arno  yields  another  day  to  dreams  of  afterglow, 
And  by  the  open  Roman  gate  the  Westering  hours 

go. 
Climb,  climb  my  lusty  lion  on  the  grim  Bargello  vane, 

1*8 


You  will  not  reach  the  sky  in  time,  be  you  however 

fain! 
Already    die    the    distant    fires    behind    the    cypress 

trees  — 

The  vesper  bells  fall  silent  as  the  sleeping  centuries ; 
While  empires  sink  to  ashes  in  the  ragged  sunset  bars, 
Over  Galileo's  tower  swing  Galileo's  stars. 


119 


A  LEGEND 

' '  I  MS  said  that  they  who  once  have  heard 
•*•        The  bells  in  Life's  high  minster  ring, 

Heed  not  the  chimes  that  cry  the  word 
Of  Avignon's  young  happening. 

The  bell  of  death  —  the  bell  of  birth  — 

Reverberate  within  the  soul, 
While  gaily  swing  the  chimes  of  mirth 

Or  soft  the  vesper  summons  toll. 

From  angelus  to  angelus 

Tis  said  their  hearts  are  inward  bowed; 
Though  outward  seeming  lifts  no  truce 

Amid  the  gay  or  toiling  crowd. 

Hushed  may  the  pealing  fall  —  or  fling 
Glad  hail  unto  the  breaking  day; 

Clear  on  the  startled  soul  they  ring  — 
The  bells  of  Life's  old  minster  grey! 


120 


RIVIERA  RAIN 

THE  April  rain  slants  southward 
Across  a  silver  sea, 
The  burden  of  its  murmur 
A  tropic  threnody. 

It  dallies  in  the  vineyards, 

The  orange  scents  pursue; 
It  wanders  'mid  the  olives 

Where  hyacinths  are  blue, 
It  lingers  in  the  almond  trees 

To  flush  them  hues  of  dawn, 
The  jasmine  dreams  her  lover 

Has  errant  come  —  and  gone. 

It  nestles  with  the  violets  — 

In  every  footfall  free 
A  vague  beloved  presentiment 

Of  immortality ; 
Where'er  it  lists  to  wander, 

Forever  in  my  heart 
It  falls  upon  a  far  sweet  grave 

To  bid  the  flowers  start. 

Summon  the  light  anemone, 
Thy  fragile  beauties  all, 

121 


RIVIERA  RAIN 

Those  pale  attendants  of  the  dusk 
That  wait  upon  thy  call ! 

Bid  them  come  forth  in  victory, 
Their  ghostly  fragrance  fling 

To  cheer  the  mortal  dust  beneath  - 
Thou  Gabriel  of  Spring! 

Go,  April  rain,  sing  seaward  — 
Beyond  the  barren  wave 

Thy  gentler  destination, 
A  far  sweet  hillside  grave. 


122 


IN  THE  PROTESTANT  CEMETERY  AT  ROME 

5/"T"NIS  here,  where  inland  tides  through  cypress  trees 

•*•        Flow  from  dream  isles  of  soft  Sicilian  name, 
In  wave-taught  accents  sighing  whence  they  came, 

Weaving  green  songs  and  pagan  sorceries, 
That  Shelley's  restless  heart  finds  dear  repose 

Near  Keats'  young  dust  strewn  o'er  with  purple 

bloom. 
No  loveless  rigours  mortalise  their  tomb, 

Nor  Wintry  winding  sheet  of  Northern  snows; 
Abiding  favourites  of  the  fickle  year, 

Oft  may  the  signs  of  vernal  solstice  change, 
Spring  and  her  violets  will  never  range 

Faithless  to  Love's  enamouring  atmosphere, 
Where  stoicism  wastes  its  chilling  breath 

On  these  who  'neath  the  ivy  leaves  are  laid, 
And  all  who  wander  questing  in  their  shade, 

Within  these  lyric  haunts  of  Summer  death. 


123 


TO  THE  BARBERINI  BEES 

Tjf  MBLAZONED  high  upon  the  canopies 
*-J     Above  Saint  Peter's  sanctified  repose, 
Hiving  'mid  papal  tombs  in  crested  shows, 
Swarming  on  pillar  and  on  haughty  frieze, 
Cluster  the  proud  old  Barberini  bees ; 
Who  live  on  incense  and  forget  the  rose, 
As  they  forget  their  brotherhood  with  those 
Dear  humble  buzzy  fellows,  overseas. 
Oh,  tell  me,  little  toilers,  do  ye  faint 
Never  for  lowly  beds  of  mignonette, 
Or  mountain  paths  with  gipsy  flowers  set? 
What  honey  lurks  in  porphyry  and  paint, 
Or  what  content  in  Summer  days  like  these 
For  vain  immortal  Barberini  bees ! 


124 


BROTHER  RENUNCIO 

A  LL  day  a  monk  in  saffron  frock 

Unlocks  the  cloister  door, 
Nor  lifts  his  dark  ascetic  eyes 
Above  the  chapel  floor; 

-  Ah,  Spring  from  veins  of  Italy  can  never  distant  be, 
While  fair  the  dim  Campagna  green  slopes  down 
ward  to  the  sea !  — 

All  day  he  takes  the  pilgrims'  dole 

For  sight  of  tomb  or  shrine, 
Nor  heeds  the  cypress,  tall  unto 

The  lilac  soft  incline; 

-  Ah,  love  'neath  sky  of  Italy  is  never  far  astray, 
And  sweet  the  cloister-lilac's  breath  at  Angelus  will 

pray !  — 

At  even-song  his  beads  he  tells 

Before  a  faded  saint; 
The  impulse  of  his  pallid  dream 

A  Magdalen  in  paint ; 

-  Ah,  night  more  lovely  than  the  day  embraces  Italy, 
The  nightingale's   enamoured   song   completes   her 

witchery !  — 


125 


BROTHER  RENUNCIO 

He  does  not  see  the  promised  land 

That  to  his  feet  descends, 
Amid  the  Winter  violets 

Begins  and  never  ends; 

-Ah,  Italy  and  Paradise  are  near  for  such  as  he, 
And  in  this  blind  immortal's  hand  lies  now  the  pos 
tern  key !  — 

My  brother,  failing  heaven  here, 
Should  you  miss  heaven  there, 
How  sad  through  purgatory's  fear 

To  miss  life  everywhere ! 
-Ah,  life  in  hearts  of  Italy,  makes  mock  of  bended 

knee, 

And  o'er  the  monastery  wall  her  birds  are  nesting 
free !  — 


126 


THE  SONG  OF  A  SLAVE  TO  HER  IDOL 

A   TEMPLE  girl  of  Love's  blind  worship,  I ! 
.  **'      No  wakeful  muezzin  calls  me  to  my  prayer, 
For  in  a  million  trivial  servitudes, 

Wherever  Love  is,  I  —  the  slave,  am  there ! 

No  golden  bangles,  mark  my  postures  light  or  ankle 

bells  the  alien  eye  discerns, 
Yet  'neath  a  fragile  minaret  unseen,  my  own  heart  in 

the  rising  incense  burns. 

Let  Azzan  barter  in  the  gay  bazar  and  slip  her  veil 

from  her  enticing  face, 
Or  in  some  dim  seraglio's  musky  dream  the  favourite 

yield  her  slender  body's  grace  — 

Where  brown-armed  water  boys  will  surely  pass, 
Fatma  and  Lalal  lie  within  the  shade  — 

Sweeter  than  yasmin  breath  the  temple's  spell  upon 
the  bending  slave  of  Love  is  laid ! 

I  serve  the  Idol  more  than  stars  serve  heaven, 
Since  dawns  betray  the  passion  of  the  sky  — 

Within  Love's  mosque  I  feed  the  quenchless  fire, 
By  day,  by  night,  a  temple  girl  am  I ! 


127 


A  SONG  OF  MARINERS 

"VX/'HAT  wind  shall  bear  us  to  the  shade? 

Our  eyes  go  blind 
With  struggle  of  the  sea  and  wearisome  mirage ; 

No  port  we  find, 
And  we  are  faint  to  guide  our  craft  by  any  star. 

O  Fate  be  kind ! 
No  more  of  siren  songs  we  dream  — 

Or  Circe's  breast, 
Or  golden  apples  of  remote  Hesperides, 

Or  guerdon  blest, 
We  only  cry  for  silence  and  eternal  shade 

Whose  heart  is  rest. 
Where  lie  those  isles  of  afternoon, 

Whose  shadows  lean 

To  heal  us  from  these  glaring  glamours  of  the 
sea? 

Whose  glooms  of  green 
Shall  fill  a  sense  nor  love  nor  beauty  filled  before 

By  heard  or  seen  ?  " 

Thus  sang  a  mariner  who  held  his  forward  watch  un 
til  he  died, 

And  thus  the  vague  pursuing  voices  of  the  waves 
replied  — 

128 


A  SONG  OF  MARINERS 

"  Turn  back,  turn  back  ye  Mariners ! 

Your  compass  learn! 

False  lies  your  course !     The  lands  ye  seek,  the 
shoals  of  youth 

Your  taffrails  spurn 
For  ocean's  idle  leagues,  and  wilful  wandering, 

Drift  far  astern ! 
For  visions  of  white  fleeting  sails 

Ye  steered  aside 
From  pensive  isles  of  far  forgotten  shade; 

For  roaming  wide 

And  hungry  sea  birds  lonely  following, —  the 
sport 

Of  witless  tide. 
Endless  and  futile  is  your  quest! 

'Neath  moons  that  wane, 

And  burning  noons,  across  this  desert  of  the 
sea 

Ye  voyage  in  vain, 
For  forward  ye  shall  never  find  the  golden  isles 

Of  youth  again !  " 


129 


THE  SUPPLIANT 

thy  mouth  full  of  flame-curving  kisses, 
Parian    mouth,    breathing    sweeter    than    lute 

strings  — 

Lures  my  heart  far  from  my  amber-eyed  shepherd, 
Seeking  thy  threshold ! 

Sadder  than  burden  of  song-weary  Sibyl 
Weighed  down  my  eyelids  by  love-laden  vision, 
Victimised  I  by  implacable  Cypris, 
Mad  but  divinely. 

Dancing  my  dance  of  ineffable  pleading, 
All  my  white  body  a  .prayer  of  the  senses, 
Lift  me  up!     Bend  to  thy  suppliant  kneeling, 
Breast  on  breast  cleaving! 

Pity  me  tranced  in  immutable  posture, — 
Hush  beyond  wonder,  impassioned  beseeching  — 
Let  the  Gods  answer,  or  smite  me  forever 
Dead  at  thine  altar! 


130 


CASSANDRA  ON  LEAVING  TROY 

T    AUGH  on,  laugh  on,  ye  faithless  Trojans,  laugh! 

The  while  your  city's  bitter  doom  fulfilled 
Sees  rampired  wall  and  palace  chamber  razed, 
The  shattered  peristyles  in  ashes  laid, 
As  she  ye  mocked  for  witless  prophesied ! 

0  God  Apollo,  did  it  not  suffice 

To  curse  the  maiden  of  your  golden  choice, 
But  she  from  overthrow  must  fail  preserve 
Her  country's  weal  ? 

Mad?     Yes,  and  justly  so; 
As  I  behold  my  augured  fears  blazed  forth 
By  light  of  burning  Trojan  citadels. 
Would  I  were  mad  and  so  escaped  disgrace 
Of  free-born  woman,  falsifier  named! 

1  knew  ye  felt  no  boding,  when  dismayed 
I  bade  ye  tremble  at  the  first  faint  sound 

Of  Helen's  name  that  troubled  Argos  heard  — 
Whose  magic,  warriors  turned  not  with  their  spears, 
Nor  could  avert  with  blazoned  shields  of  wise 
Device,  and  cunning  wrought.     I  warned  ye  smite 
That  name  of  Helen, —  at  which  women  paled 
In  dread  to  find  their  beauty  less  than  hers, 
That  name  men  whispered  bodeless  of  its  power 
Or  sins  unsinned  unto  her  Grecian  grace  — 


CASSANDRA  ON  LEAFING  TROY 

Imagined  beauty,  myth  of  Ilium, 

Than  all  their  loveliest  loves  more  fair !     Laugh,  Troy ! 
Laugh  on !     Now  is  Cassandra  mad  indeed ! 
What  tears  so  mad  as  laughter  like  to  yours? 

Till  now  untold  my  fate,  save  to  deaf  ears 
Of  Gods  at  sacrificial  altars  red; 
Hear  me,  and  may  avenging  Deity 
And  mindful  Fury  hear!     For  ne'er  my  guide 
Was  Mercury,  the  patron  of  deceit. 
The  fairest  of  all  Priam's  daughters  I, 
Cassandra,  wide  and  triple  famed  for  dire 
Misfortune,  beauty  and  divining  power. 
Nor  arms  most  lustrous,  horses  panoplied 
For  war,  seas  with  their  gleaming  galleys  sown, 
The  spangled  night,  the  sacred  ilex  groves 
More  beautiful, —  her  suitors  swore, —  than  She, 
The  maiden  Priestess  of  Fatality! 
Apollo's  Priestess  of  the  cool  green  shrine  — 
Minerva's  suppliant,  by  whose  desire 
Corcebus  was  compelled, —  a  warrior  called 
To  Priam's  aid  in  'leaguered  Troy's  relief, 
Who  laid  his  arms  and  prowess  at  her  feet. 
His  suit  dismissed  by  death  to  those  low  halls 
Of  sunless  shades,  next  Prince  Othryoneus, 
An  ally  hither  come  from  Thrace, —  besought 
Her  for  her  beauty,  asked  no  other  dower ; 
But  he  by  Idomeneus  fatal  struck, 
To  Pluto's  house  of  tears  was  forced  retire. 
Beauty  accursed,  with  evil  Helen  shared ! 

132 


CASSANDRA  ON  LEAFING  TROY 

Apollo  looking  on  his  Priestess  found 
Her  fair,  and  offered  her  whatever  prize 
She  coveted  for  favour  of  her  love. 

For  gift  of  prophecy  I  did  consent 

With  Loxias  —  which  once  conferred,  I  swift 

Withdrew  and  mocked  the  Tempter,  who  had  sought 

Of  his  most  holy  altar's  ministrant 

Ignoble  use.     And  then,  since  it  was  held 

Too  all  unworthy  of  a  God,  re-take 

What  he  had  given,  on  hid  revenge  intent 

He  did  constrain  a  kiss  exchanged.     O  kiss 

Of  doom,  I  dared  not  from  a  God  refuse ! 

By  whose  excess  of  poisoned  favour  sweet 

Confused,  my  lips  shall  never  cease  to  mourn! 

Incursive  Deity,  impassioning 

Each  in-drawn  breath  of  men  until  they  deem 

Themselves  the  Lords  of  women  evermore  — 

Spirit  of  wanton  Capture  —  woe  to  thee  ! 

For  since  the  Gods  avenge  their  love  denied, 

The  altars  are  o'erturned,  the  Vestals  wronged, 

Both  Gods  and  mortals  to  delirium  brought 

By  mingling  things  of  heaven  with  things  of  earth. 

Woe  for  the  kiss  of  Fate,  that  baneful  kiss ! 

Woe  to  Cassandra,  knowing  all  too  late 

Giving,  he  took.     O  tragedy  of  Love ! 

In  that  ill-reasoned  kiss  of  God  to  maid, 

The  gift  of  riddles  dark  read  plain  was  hers, 

But  faith  of  all  men  stolen  from  her  truth. 


133 


Aid  me,  ye  Muses!     Tune  despairing  lyres, 

And  chaunt  the  direful  song  of  Loxias'  kiss ! 

Nor  cease  until  his  golden  arrow-tips 

Have  pierced  the  coldest,  most  reluctant  heart! 

Sing  how  the  Sun  God  all  the  sky  suffused 

With  swooning  stupors,  ere  he  bodeful  pressed 

His  melting  passion  through  her  scorched  lips, 

As  were  the  glory  of  Immortals  blurred 

Within,  yet  at  that  fiery  contact  made, 

As  mortal  with  a  mortal  one, —  then  left 

Her  frantic,  raving  on  discredited ! 

Almighty  Jove !     O  is  it  God-like  thus 

Vengeance  to  wreak  on  hapless  maids  who  shun 

Those  pleasures  interdicted  by  thy  laws  — 

Unfitting  twixt  a  mortal  and  a  God? 

Such  vengeful  lust  the  wild  boar  well  be-seems, 

Whose  prey  slow-gliding  him  by  stealth  eludes 

Along  some  sedgy  river  iris-fringed. 

Because  I  would  not  turn  from  altar  fires 

To  grant  the  madness  of  a  mortal  flame, 

Apollo  raged!     The  kiss  he  ruthless  set 

As  price  of  his  prophetic  gift  divine, 

How  was  a  virtuous  Vestal  to  withhold? 

When  the  Gods  sue,  resistance  nought  avails. 

She  served  her  Gods,  he  urged, —  then  why  not  serve 

Her  God  for  his.  delight?     These  lithe  limbs  bent 

In  sacrificial  grace, —  these  amorous  lips, 

These  Venus-haunted  breasts, —  why  should  she  waste 

In  barren  service  of  a  common  shrine? 


134 


CASSANDRA  ON'  LEAVING  TROY 

Apollo  mocked  such  infamy  —  and  kissed  — 
Then  ere  his  radiant  way  pursued,  he  spake  — 

"  And  so,  frail  urn  of  mortal  beauties, —  glad 

Thou  would'st  proclaim  the  hidden  future?     Warn 

Of  hateful  war  and  fatal  lightning  flash, 

Of  seas  tumultuous  engulfing  ship 

And  mariner  to  death?     These  portents  dread 

Prefer  with  insight  ominous  to  divulge, 

Rather  than  life  of  undistracted  love 

In  present  nuptials  with  a  craving  God? 

Rather  than  him  thine  arms  would  clasp  embraced 

His  laurelled  altars  chill,  serve  him  afar  — 

Nor  feel  within  thee  stir  those  fires  that  break 

The  fecund  Spring  to  blessing?     Forces  loosed 

That  wing  the  sandals  of  the  languid  streams 

As  hasted  messengers  to  rise  and  run? 

Through  fruitless  vintage  cause  the  life  blood  flow, 

That  fond  libations  may  be  purple  poured, 

And  swell  the  store  of  blossoms  for  the  bee, 

Lest  pure  white  honey  fail,  to  appease  the  shrines? 

Such  powers  as  from  Olympus'  throne  the  Gods 

Descending,  deign  on  mortals  loved  bestow  ? 

O  Wayward  One !     Be  it  as  thou  hast  willed ! 

Most  melancholy  madness  shall  be  thine, 

And  hostile  presage  lie  upon  that  breast, 

Where  might  have  lain  young  gods  with  all  their  Sire's 

Immortal  attributes.     Thine  eyes,  close  veiled 

To  splendours  of  his  devastating  flame, 

Be  glazed  by  burning  cities,  reek  of  gore, 

135 


CASSANDRA  ON  LEAFING  TROY 

Disaster  murk, —  nor  shall  thy  madness  serve 
To  save  one  city  from  the  appointed  doom, 
One  armed  host  from  ruin's  shame;  though  men 
Shall  surely  weep  —  too  late  —  the  augured  ill 
Thy  tongue  deplores !  " 

Alas  for  truth  inspired! 
As  no  blind  beggar  by  the  city  gate 
Would  spurn  the  aid  of  open  eyes,  the  world 
Refusing  sight  of  me,  I  am  by  wile 
Of  Loxias  thus  deprived  to  avert  from  Troy 
The  dread  catastrophe ;  for  what  shall  be 
Already  is.     Futile  the  bellowing  bulls 
Of  sacrifice,  and  foresight  that  but  serves 
To  illumine  hope  deceived  and  labour  lost! 
Pleasure  and  peace  are  gone  in  ill  foreknown, 
No  agony  of  mine  can  right  the  wrong, 
Nor  saving  sight  procure  immunity 
For  them,  most  holy  in  my  love.     A  sad 
And  wretched  Priestess,  I  —  of  altars  lone, 
A  vestal  blameless, —  save  that  I  was  fair; 
No  frenzied  watcher  of  the  chariot  race, 
Hot-flushed  inciter  of  the  flying  steeds  — 
No  Nymph  enticing  Satyrs  to  the  dance 
When  Pan  pipes  up  the  vernal  lure  of  Spring, 
No  Coryphee  of  Aphrodite's  train, 
Nor  dew-drenched  worshipper  upon  the  hills 
In  Dionysus'  fawn-skinned  bacchanal, 
But  solemn-browed,  uplifting  unto  Fate 
A  consecrated  gaze  oft  veiled  in  tears. 
Inspired  sole  by  grim  Eumenides 

136 


CASSANDRA  ON  LEAVING  TROY 

I  am  declared,  brain-sick  and  sore  distraught, 

When  overtaken  by  prophetic  throes 

Inflicted1  by  the  God;  like  to  that  bird 

For  Itys,  Itys !  wailing  unassuaged, 

Incarnate  Sorrow,  she,  to  whose  lament 

The  Gods  gave  wings  and  voice  to  plain  men's  griefs 

Forever ! 

From  lips  of  divination 
111  only  comes,  no  boon,  the  mockers  cry  — 
As  were  the  sacred  Prophetess  in  league 
With  Hades'  rulers  sworn.     In  vain  I  warned ! 
The  bridal  woe  of  Paris,  senseless  cause 
For  siege  prolonged  and  fateful  destiny 
Of  war,  foretold  with  eyes  to  heaven  raised, 
My  hands  weighed  by  your  chains.     In  vain  I  raved ! 
Mad  was  I  called,  the  oracles  ignored  — 
But  their  fulfillment  when  did  Time  refute? 
The  siege  once  brought  to  pass,  I  refuge  took 
In  great  Minerva's  temple, —  but  for  nought, 
Since  impious  Ajax,  ravisher  abhorred ! 
Seduced  by  rumour  of  my  beauty  cursed  — 
Did  violate  the  laws  of  all  the  Gods 
And   robbed   the   shrines   to   drag  me    forth;   which 

straight 

The  irate  Goddess  terrible  avenged, 
From  Jupiter  demanding  thunderbolts 
And  'mid  the  ensuing  floods  the  Locrian  hosts 
Destroying  to  the  last.     She  still  requires 
Them  bring  each  year  as  tribute,  maidens  twain 
To  serve  her  temple  by  most  menial  rites, 

137 


CASSANDRA  ON  LEAVING  TROY 

In  tattered  rags  attired,  their  hair  close  shorn; 

But  even  griefs  like  those  Cassandra  bore 

Could  not  preserve  her  from  the  Argive  King. 

Victorious  Agamemnon  had  sought  out 

The  vanquished  Priam's  child  for  one  more  shame; 

Drawn  by  no  indiscriminate  lot,  as  were 

The  lesser  Phrygian  maids,  by  chance  conferred, 

But  for  the  love  her  stricken  beauty  moved, 

Torn  from  the  unprotecting  shrines  and  given 

As  slave  and  paramour  to  Hellas'  Lord  — 

Hapless,  prophetic,  beautiful, —  Alas 

For  love  unconquerable  that  enslaves 

The  Conqueror  ev'n  as  his  meanest  thrall ! 

Whom  neither  the  Immortals  may  evade, 

Nor  man,  their  changing  suppliant  of  a  day. 

Wail  for  your  daughter  Hecuba !  Wail  forth 

The  curse  of  beauty  drawing  curse  of  love! 

While  yet  she  lives,  shrill  lamentations  raise 

And  beat  your  breast  with  woe  funereal ; 

Since  over  her  no  mournful  dirge  shall  sound 

Whose  limbs  on  alien  shores  shall  ne'er  be  wrapped 

In  decent  garments  by  maternal  hands, 

Her  pallid  corpse  a  feast  for  ravening  dogs. 

By  Phrygian  unbelief  the  sacred  shrines 

Are  now  despoiled,  their  images  profaned  — 

My  own  undoing  swiftly  verified 

At  pleasure  of  the  Argive  Potentate. 

For  nothing  pray !     Spare  now  your  chorused  hymn, 

Your  impotent  libations  cease  to  pour! 

138 


CASSANDRA  ON  LEAFING  TROY 

Too  late  the  festive  dance  and  heifer  slain, 
For  nought  reviled  the  injustice  of  male  love 

And  face  of  Helen,  Sorceress  malign ! 

i 

Yet  there  is  retribution  with  the  Gods, 

For  Jupiter  and  Loxias  are  both 

To  mortal  matters  lending  high  concern; 

Now  dizzy  anguish  mounts  within  my  breast, 

Prophetic  rage  o'erwhelms,  and  I  perceive 

Dardania  commemorative  rear 

A  votive  temple,  sacred  to  all  maids 

Who  serve  the  Gods,  nor  'neath  the  yoke  of  men 

Are  willed  to  live ;  revolting  from  their  lust, 

And  consecrate  to  utmost  chastity. 

A  babbler  I,  for  this?    Lie-monger  called? 

Let  me  be  silent  led  to  my  captivity  — 

Calamity  predestined  by  the  Gods! 

O  Woe,  O  Earth,  O  God  Apollo !     May 

My  spirit  soon  hear  echoes  of  that  stream  — 

Scamander  river  dear  to  infancy, 

On  whose  green  shores  my  few  bright  hours  were 

nursed ! 

O  agony  of  vision  vainly  borne! 
Though  none  believe  the  oracles  poured  forth, 
Troy  and  her  slain  by  me  shall  be  avenged. 
Triumphant  to  these  nuptials  sinister 
Departing  Lord  of  Hellas,  now  I  come  — 
More  fatal  bride  than  ever  Helen  proved, 
No  Priestess  but  a  herald  stern  of  Death, 
Seeing  my  dusty  bed  in  darkness  made, 

139 


This  peerless  head  crowned  by  one  act  supreme. 
I  come  my  Dead!     Thrice  shining  Erebus, 
For  me  illumined  by  familiar  Shades ! 
My  garland  and  my  gold-embroidered  robe, 
My  wand  and  myrtle  wreath  are  cast  aside, 
Renounced  the  last  insignia  of  the  Gods, 
Ere  I,  the  sainted  of  Apollo,  come 
All  unappalled  to  accost  the  gates  of  Night. 
For,  Mistress  of  divining  power,  I  know 
The  end  for  Agamemnon  now  prepared. 
Let  Hades  and  all  those  beneath  the  earth 
Be  conscious  of  my  words,  for  he  shall  fall, 
If  he  return,  by  his  supplanter's  hand; 
The  house  of  Atreus  be  in  ruins  laid. 
I  see  it  plainer  than  their  galley  sails 
That  nodding  summon  from  my  native  shore. 
Mad,  mad !  ye  call  me,  to  the  last  defy 
My  solemn  prophecy, —  yet  ye  shall  see 
This  proud  despoiler  in  his  crimson  bath 
Lie  weltering  beneath  Aegisthus'  blade, 
While  his  abominable  she-wolf  slakes 
Her  thirst  for  gore  with  mine,  and  this  despised 
Cassandra,  once  for  all,  dismisses  mute; 
A  bloody-taloned  bird  with  clashing  wings 
That  idly  beat  the  wide  ill-omened  air. 
Farewell,  O  ashen  city  of  disdain! 
Until  the  infuriate  Erinnyes 
Shall  right  my  wrongs,  on  Troy  I  look  my  last ! 
Almighty  Jove,  o'er  all  supreme,  behold 
How  tides  of  blood  my  oracles  confirm ! 

140 


CASSANDRA  ON  LEAVING  TROY 

Minerva,  patroness  of  cities,  heed! 
Bereaved  of  freedom  and  of  home  I  go, 
My  torch  put  out ! 

But  throughout  Time  avenged, 
Cassandra's  curse  shall  evermore  descend; 
Hers  be  the  fate  of  wisdom  and  of  all 
Who  share  the  burden  of  the  visioned  Seer ! 
By  men  the  truth  shall  be  forever  spurned, 
The  base-born  tongue  of  flattery  preferred, 
And  unbelief  envenom  all  the  world ! 


141 


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